Fifth Third donates $10K to Burton Middle School’s Young Bankers Club

Fifth Third donates $10K to Burton Middle School’s Young Bankers Club
Marcus Jackson, left, and Rosie Holmes. <strong> Courtesy Fifth Third Bank </strong>

Fifth Third Bank made a $10,000 technology grant to Burton Middle School to support the school’s engagement with the new virtual Young Bankers Club program.

Fifth Third Bank, National Association on Tuesday, Nov. 23, said it made 13 technology grants of $10,000 to schools and nonprofit organizations across its footprint that have active engagement with the bank’s new digital Young Bankers Club program, its signature financial education program for fifth-grade students.

First offered in 2004, the Fifth Third Young Bankers Club was redesigned earlier this year as a digital program to deliver an experience that accommodates virtual or classroom learning. It is compatible with laptops, desktop computers and mobile devices, including tablets, and is offered to schools and community organizations at no cost.

One of the 13 grants was made to Burton Middle School in Grand Rapids.

“We are excited to be able to support a community school who has students actively engaged in our digital YBC program,” said Marcus Jackson, community and economic development director for Fifth Third Bank. “This grant will enable the school to bolster their financial curriculum while improving access to technology so students can gain the knowledge and expertise provided by our Young Bankers Club.”

Rosie Holmes, LOOP after-school program director for GRPS, said the district was “honored” to receive the Young Bankers Club grant.

“The partnership with Fifth Third Bank and the Young Bankers Club (YBC) has been a great experience for more than 18 years,” Holmes said. “Staff, LOOP scholars and families have enjoyed learning about financial literacy. … The Young Bankers Club teaches our scholars how to be financially responsible (and) the importance of planning, saving and money management.”

The new Young Bankers Club digital format features a curriculum that meets national and state educational standards for fifth-grade mathematics. Each lesson in the eight-unit curriculum, which is presented through a game, is designed to provide an engaging approach to financial literacy and help students apply their knowledge gradually as they work toward more complex scenarios. The program incorporates different facets of banking, while identifying relevant math standards within each unit and outlining what students should know and how to use the information.

A new feature in the digital format is the introduction of the 10-year-old character Maximillion Money, the president of Young Bankers Club and the richest kid in America. Maximillion Money guides the participants and his friends on a journey that takes them to the New York Stock Exchange, the U.S. Mint, other financial industry landmarks and to a Fifth Third financial center. Students discover hidden clues, win rewards and badges, unlock avatars, advance to new levels and adventures each week, take weekly trivia quizzes to test their knowledge and challenge themselves to be first on the class leaderboard.

Each lesson includes a level that focuses on one of the following aspects of personal finance:

  • Budgeting
  • Banking and payment methods
  • Overspending and lending to others
  • Borrowing money
  • Jobs and income
  • Saving and investing
  • Risk management and insurance

Young Bankers Club is part of Fifth Third’s Lives Improved Through Financial Empowerment (LIFE) program, which delivers financial learning opportunities to people at all ages and stages of life.

More information about Young Bankers Club program is at 53.com/ybc.