First United Bank of Madill and Kingston proudly congratulates the 2024 graduating junior students of the first annual Pillar Academy. The goal of this program was to teach ten students from Madill and Kingston about the bank’s four pillars, while teaching the importance of community involvement and lifelong skills.
Pillar Academy encompassed First United’s four pillars: Personal Growth, Faith, Financial Well Being, and Health and Wellness. For Personal Growth, the students were given tools to explore and develop their own individual strengths withFirstUnitedBank’sown Learning and Development trainer, Brandon Fields. The Faith pillar session had Fasiri Ellison, Director of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes in Southeastern Oklahoma, speak to the students about ways to seek God and how to live a life of meaning and purpose. For Financial Well-Being, Madill and Kingston First United Bank employees led the session covering budgeting, credit, checking accounts, andtheimportance of savings. The Health and Wellness session had Dan Little and Amy Ortloff, both long time Madill residents, speak on the importance of physical and mental health.
In addition to covering the four pillars, students also were involved in United Acts of Kindness Day in February, where they chose to put together gift baskets for all dentist/doctor’s offices in Madill and Kingston as a thank you for their service to our community. They also painted rocks with kind messages on them and placed them around Madill and Kingston parks and the square. Lastly, the students placed sticky notes with acts of kindness for other students to complete around Madill and Kingston High Schools.
The students also got to visit First United Bank’s corporate headquarters in Durant where they received a tour of the bank and heard from several executives and leaders about the bank’s values, their own personal stories, and encouraging words about the student’s future. Students also got to do some mock interviews with retail management staff in preparation for real-life interviews they’ll have in the future.
FacilitatorsEddieRamirez and Bethany Goates of First United Bank said this about the students: ‘We sincerely congratulate the students on their completion of this program, and we wish you the best your senior year and beyond. We will miss these students-they were engaged, focused, and had a willingness to learn throughout. We look forward to next year’s group of students for Pillar Academy.’
Students are writing a one-page paper on how they can apply what they learned from Pillar Academy, which will in part determine who gets one of two $500 scholarships given to one student from Madill and one student from Kingston. These scholarships will be awarded at