A BART station agent says he has been fired for giving $300 in tickets to a needy teenager against the transit system’s rules.

Jim Stanek told the Chronicle he found out he lost his job in a letter from BART officials Tuesday, his 66th birthday.

“I am terminated,” said the Novato resident, who worked for the transit system for seven years.

This spring, a friend’s 16-year-old grandson was struggling to pay for his daily BART commute from the East Bay to Flex Academy, a charter high school in San Francisco. The trip costs about $200 a month.

When Stanek learned of the boy’s dilemma, he gave him $300 worth of paid, unused tickets that commuters left behind at the Daly City station booth where Stanek worked. Stanek said he knew the act was against the rules, but he wanted to “help the kid.”

“I feel devastated,” he told the Chronicle. “Did I expect it? Yes. It’s kind of the way things go with BART. I don’t know if public opinion matters to them — it doesn’t, I guess.”

The transit system handed down its decision a week and a half after Stanek defended the situation during a six-hour hearing with BART officials.

Stanek said he plans to appeal the decision through his union. He said the union will allow him to keep his health care and pension, whose amount he declined to state, for up to five years.