Bank of the Sierra Donates $16K to Asian Pacific Community Fund to Create College Scholarship Program
March 22, 2021
Porterville, Calif. – Bank of the Sierra is excited to partner with the Asian Pacific Community Fund (APCF) to launch its 2021 scholarship program with eight $2,000 scholarships for low- and moderate-income (LMI) students. The scholarships will be awarded to high school seniors within the Bank’s footprint, which includes Fresno, Kern, Kings, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, Tulare, and Ventura counties, plus the Santa Clarita area of Los Angeles County. A total of $16,000 will financially assist these economically disadvantaged students in their pursuit of higher education.
Since 2001, APCF has managed several LMI scholarship programs and already has a strong infrastructure in place to market and administer this new scholarship program. Bank of the Sierra will also actively reach out to community-based organizations in the area and engage its employees to volunteer their times to read and review scholarship applications and essays.
Students interested in applying for a scholarship must be high school seniors planning to attend college in the fall of 2021 as a full-time, degree-seeking student. The scholarship is open to all majors and has no ethnicity requirement. Interested students should visit apcf.org/bank-of-the-sierra-scholarship-open for more information and a link to the application. All forms and required materials must be submitted by 11:59 p.m. on Friday, April 2.
“We’re thrilled to offer funding to an organization like the APCF that has the experience necessary to create and manage scholarship programs for students in need,” said Kevin McPhaill, Bank of the Sierra President and Chief Executive Officer. “Helping local high school students reach their college dreams is just one way we’re giving back to our communities in 2021!”
About APCF
The Asian Pacific Community Fund (APCF) was founded over 20 years ago by leaders in the Asian and Pacific Islander (API) community. The goals of the organization are to increase philanthropy among Asian Americans, sustain and grow the API nonprofit sector, and to advocate for API communities. APCF’s fundraising efforts have included employee giving campaigns, donor-advised funds, giving circles, grant making, scholarship funds, and capacity building initiatives. APCF is the only community-based fund serving API communities in
Southern California since 1990. APCF believes that higher education is the best ticket out of poverty and the more education students get beyond high school, the better their prospects are. However, college affordability is always the main concern to students from low- and moderate-income families.
About Bank of the Sierra
Bank of the Sierra is in its 44th year of operations and is the largest independent bank headquartered in the South San Joaquin Valley. Bank of the Sierra is a community-centric regional bank, which offers a full range of retail and commercial banking services with full-service branches located within the counties of Tulare, Kern, Kings, Fresno, Los Angeles, Ventura, San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara. The bank also maintains a loan production office and an online branch and provides specialized lending services through an agricultural credit center and an SBA center. Bank of the Sierra is recognized as one of the strongest and top-performing community banks in the country with a 5-star rating from Bauer Financial.
