Advance Kansas Receives $5,000 Grant from Westar Energy

Butler Community College received a $5,000 grant from Westar Energy in support of its Advance Kansas initiative. The grant will help fund the 2018 class session in which leaders from all sectors of the community will meet over the course of four months to form relationships and develop skills to become better leaders in increasingly diverse organizations and communities. Between class sessions, members work in teams to create community-action projects designed to positively impact the lives of people in our communities. 

An alumna of the program and Butler’s president, Kimberly Krull, Ph.D. said, “Butler is grateful for Westar’s support and shared commitment to improving the quality of life for everyone in our communities. Advance Kansas is cultivating a network of leaders who understand and appreciate the diversity that exists around them and who know how to lead in our diverse society. The end goal is to create communities that work well for everyone.”    

Advance Kansas is hosted by Butler Community College with support from Spirit AeroSystems, Westar Energy and Meritrust Credit Union and is facilitated by Juan Johnson, president of Diversity Leadership in Action, of Atlanta.

For more information about Advance Kansas, please contact Mary Moon at 316.218.6338 or [email protected]

About Butler/Advance Kansas

Butler Community College, with nearly 10,000 students, offers nearly 85 degree programs and 30 professional certification programs. The college’s main campus is in El Dorado, but it has centers in five other communities. For more information about Butler, visit www.butlercc.edu, on Facebook and Twitter (@butlercc).

About Westar Energy

Westar Energy, Inc. (NYSE: WR) is Kansas’ largest electric utility. For more than a century, we have provided Kansans the safe, reliable electricity needed to power their businesses and homes. Every day our team of professionals takes on projects to generate and deliver electricity, protect the environment and provide excellent service to our nearly 700,000 customers. Westar has 7,200 MW of electric generation capacity fueled by coal, uranium, natural gas, wind and landfill gas. We are also a leader in electric transmission in Kansas. Our innovative customer service programs include mobile-enabled customer care, a smart meter pilot project and paving the way for electric vehicle adoption. Our employees live, volunteer and work in the communities we serve.