LOCAL

Seaman High School Bank celebrates remodeling in 90th year of existence

Steve Fry
Zach Patton (left) makes change for Nicholas Brady when Brady purchased a Seaman High School car tag at the high school’s bank. Patton and Brady are 17-year-old seniors. (Steve Fry/The Capital-Journal)

A steady stream of customers entered and exited a bank north of the Kansas River during the Monday lunch hour, and the tellers took cash and made change.

The bank makes loans, charges interest, uses banking policies and procedures, and its president is 17. It’s the Seaman High School Bank, which is 90 years old.

“We do the entire financial operation,” Kevin Hoffmans, bank sponsor, said Monday after a ceremony to mark the remodeling of the bank. “Most of the school’s finances go through the bank.”

For example, sports officials are paid for their work with bank checks, money collected at fundraising events is deposited in the bank, students and faculty members can open savings accounts, money generated at sports events is deposited at the bank, and two accounts from a Seaman elementary school are deposited there, Hoffmans said.

Hoffmans teaches personal finance, marketing, introduction to business, entrepreneurship and banking classes.

“We audit ourselves every week,” Hoffmans said. According to the latest audit, the bank has assets of $326,988, he said.

Since it started in 1927, deposits in the Seaman High School Bank have totalled $14,051,767, Hoffmans said.

The bank operates for 60 to 90 minutes a day during the lunch hour.

Juniors and seniors work in the bank and manage it. High school bankers who are seniors hold leadership posts, including the president and vice president, and juniors learn the ropes from the seniors and work in customer relations and information technology, Hoffmans said.

Juniors learn about bank operations from the president, Zach Patton, and other seniors, Hoffmans said.

Hoffmans, who took over as sponsor of the bank in 1996, isn’t concerned that the operation of the bank is in the hands of high school students.

The Seaman High School Bank deposits are actually placed in the Silver Lake Bank, and with that link, the high school bank is insured by Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, he said.

“When you are in your second year (as a senior), you understand the policies and procedures and how to put them in place,” Hoffmans said. “Because of that, I sleep OK at night.”

In his junior year, Patton filled out an application to work in the bank, then was interviewed by the bank seniors and the sponsor, and he joined the bank. He worked as a teller, kept track of the bank books, worked in personnel and set up the teller windows.

Bank business runs heavy when school athletics and clubs are busy, Patton said.

“For the most part, we’re pretty busy,” he said.

“I’ve had a lot of experience how a bank runs,” Patton said, but added that ledger books were “completely new to me” when he started. Teaching others about banking has been a good way to learn yet more about the subject, Patton said.

When he attends college, Patton intends to major in banking.

Seaman principal Michael Monaghan said the bank remodeling project included the increased use of computer technology in the bank. The bank now has an ATM and night deposit in the school, Monaghan said. The high school bankers learn about dual entry of debits and credits, and technology will be used in the dual entries.

Seaman High School is one of the few high schools in Kansas where a student must take a personal finance course, which teaches students about loans, checking and savings accounts, interest rates and other topics.

“Banking is an advanced extension of personal finance,” Monaghan said.

Contact reporter Steve Fry at (785) 295-1206 or @TCJCourtsNCrime on Twitter.