April 2, 2021

It doesn’t take much to be kind – shoveling snow off an elderly neighbor’s sidewalk, paying for the car behind you in a fast-food drive-thru, volunteering at a homeless shelter. These all are great examples of acts of kindness.

Dealing with the ongoing pandemic and social injustice issues, we need kindness now more than ever. FirstEnergy is helping to bring more acts of kindness to light through Kindland –  a new initiative developed by the Values-in-Action Foundation (VIAF) in Cleveland.

Kindland is part of VIAF’s national Just Be Kind campaign, which aims to make kindness a unifying national value in America. The FirstEnergy Foundation is a sponsor of this important initiative.

“For more than two decades, the Values in Action Foundation has made it their mission to teach and provide skills to students and educators to lead with the spirit of kindness, respect and caring for others and their schools and communities,” said Lorna Wisham, vice president, Corporate Affairs and Community Involvement, and president of the FirstEnergy Foundation. “The FirstEnergy Foundation is proud to sponsor this new initiative and we’re excited for our employees to participate at a time when ethnic bias and hatred are on the rise.”

Mark Jones, regional president, The Illuminating Company (CEI), is leading the Kindland, effort for CEI employees.

“The past year has been such a challenge – with so many people suffering from the pandemic. Once I learned about the Kindland initiative from our Corporate Affairs and Community Involvement team, I was hooked,” Mark said.

Cleveland will serve as an example for the rest of the country by focusing the collective efforts of its surrounding communities, businesses, schools and local organizations on creating and sustaining a unified sense of kindness, compassion, empathy and understanding. These values will be the guiding force behind our community coming together to find solutions to our nation’s most prominent issues including navigating through the COVID-19 crisis, social justice, racism and political polarization.

“Even though Kindland focuses on Cleveland and northeast Ohio, the Just Be Kind initiative is national – so we can promote it companywide,” said Mark. “FirstEnergy employees do amazing things when it comes to helping each other and our neighbors in need. Now they can share their good stories.”

Kindly Tell Your story!

If you want to participate in this fun and uplifting effort, just use social media to report your random acts of kindness and/or kindnesses you’ve experienced from others, The national goal is to have 1 million posts by the end of the year.

You’ll find more information on how to participate on the Values in Action website*.

“Let’s start focusing on the good things,” Mark said. “Hopefully, we all can find a way to move forward in a positive light.”

*By clicking the link in this article, you are entering a website maintained by an outside party, which is entirely responsible for the site’s content.

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