Bank of America has launched a program to support the needs of military service members and veterans. Called “Express Your Thanks,” the goal is to donate up to $1 million nationally to Welcome Back Veterans and the Wounded Warrior Project (WWP).
Through the campaign, customers, bank employees and other individuals can make simple online expressions of gratitude, each generating a $1 donation from the Bank of America Charitable Foundation to the organizations.
The campaign runs through Veteran’s Day, November 11. People can participate by taking a photo, creating a video or writing a message of support and sharing it on www.bankofamerica.com/troopthanks or posting on Twitter with the hash tag #troopthanks. Selected messages will be highlighted in Times Square beginning in July and expressions of thanks will be shared with military nonprofit organizations.
Funds donated by the Bank of America Charitable Foundation will support economic empowerment programs provided by WWP and will help fund Welcome Back Veterans’ national network of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) Centers of Excellence created by America’s leading university hospitals.
Ongoing Bank of America employee volunteer activities will continue during the campaign as an opportunity to extend the company’s support of military service members and their families. Last year, employee volunteers donated nearly 23,000 hours of volunteer time and expertise through activities ranging from packing care packages for military serving overseas to providing financial education to returning veterans.
Bank of America in Arizona supports veterans in and out of the company and recently collaborated with Arizona Women’s Education & Employment (AWEE) on a Vets Coaching Vets program through which the bank’s veteran’s affinity group mentors previously homeless or incarcerated veterans working with AWEE to put their lives back together.
The mission of Wounded Warrior Project (WWP) is to honor and empower Wounded Warriors. WWP’s purpose is to raise awareness and to enlist the public’s aid for the needs of injured service members, to help injured servicemen and women aid and assist each other, and to provide unique, direct programs and services to meet their needs. WWP is a national, nonpartisan organization headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida. To get involved and learn more, visit woundedwarriorproject.org.
Welcome Back Veterans, an initiative of Major League Baseball Charities and the Robert R. McCormick Foundation, provides grants to university hospitals throughout the country that provide post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and traumatic brain injury (TBI) treatment to veterans and their families in a public/private partnership. Currently, Welcome Back Veterans is funding programs at Weill Cornell in New York City, The University of Michigan, Rush University Medical Center, Duke University, Emory University, UCLA and the Boston Red Sox’ Home Base Program at Mass General Hospital in Boston. These institutions are developing new programs and strategies to improve the quality, quantity and access to PTSD and TBI treatment for veterans, particularly those returning from duty in Iraq and Afghanistan.
