COVENTRY — Coventry High School sophomore Nicole Trudell recently shared a little bit of her heart with the American Heart Association with a donation of $820 that she raised this spring.

In a ceremony at the school last Wednesday, Nicole, 15, presented the check to representatives of the national organization.

She raised the money with a bowling tournament she organized as a so-called capstone project, one of several new prerequisites for receiving a high school diploma in Rhode Island.

She was inspired to raise the money for the Heart Association by the death of a cousin, Patrick Coulter, 14, who had been diagnosed years ago with a heart condition known as ventricular tachycardia. Patrick, a ninth-grader at Coventry High School, was attending a Providence Bruins game at the Dunkin’ Donuts Center with his church group last Nov. 23 when he suffered cardiac arrest. He died the next day.

“I knew Patrick very well. … We went to school together. We saw each other on the holidays and at family gatherings,” Nicole said last week. “He passed away around the time I had to pick a [project] topic. This seemed to click. I definitely feel a lot better after I did it, that I can look back and say I did a good deed.”

Nicole, an avid bowler, held the fundraiser at AMF Lang’s Lanes, on Niantic Avenue in Cranston.