Citizens Bank encourages donations during final week of Gear for Grades program

PITTSBURGH – There is still time to donate new school supplies to Citizens Bank’s Gear for Grades program that will send 4,550 local children back to school with important items to help them learn. Now through August 9 pencils, pens, notebooks, folders and other school supplies can be donated at any Citizens Bank branch across western and central Pennsylvania.

The Gear for Grades program is a part of Citizens Helping Citizens Strengthen Communities, the bank’s program for contributing to the economic vitality of communities. Since 2003, the program has helped more than 215,000 children across the bank’s footprint where it operates as Citizens Bank in New England and the Mid-Atlantic and Charter One in the Midwest.

“Through the Gear for Grades program, thousands of children in Pennsylvania will return to school with essential school supplies like notebooks, pencils and pocket folders that will help them succeed in the classroom,” said Daniel K. Fitzpatrick, President, Citizens Bank and RBS Citizens for Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware. “We thank everyone who has already donated school supplies to this year’s program and want to remind the public that there is still time to make a donation that will contribute to the academic success of so many children in our community.”

This year’s program is in partnership with the Homeless Children’s Education Fund.

Citizens Helping Citizens Strengthen Communities is part of the bank’s broader Citizens Helping Citizens program addressing five key areas: hunger, housing, economic development, financial education and volunteerism. Get more information about Citizens Bank’s community initiatives online.

About Citizens Helping Citizens
Grounded in the belief that a good bank gives back to its community and to the people who live there, Citizens Helping Citizens is a program embracing the community goals of RBS Citizens Financial Group, Inc. – the commercial bank holding company serving consumer and small business customers as Citizens Bank and Charter One and commercial banking customers as RBS Citizens. The Citizens Helping Citizens program comprises five key initiatives supported directly by RBSCFG and also by its nonprofit charitable foundations, the Citizens Charitable Foundation, the Citizens Bank Foundation and the Charter One Foundation: Citizens Helping Citizens Fight Hunger, Citizens Helping Citizens Provide Shelter, Citizens Helping Citizens Strengthen Communities (economic development), Citizens Helping Citizens Teach Money Management (financial education) and Citizens Helping Citizens Give (volunteerism and colleague charitable donations). Across all of these initiatives, Citizens Helping Citizens strives to enhance quality of life and economic vitality in local communities.

About Citizens Bank of Pennsylvania
Citizens Bank of Pennsylvania is a state-chartered bank with dual headquarters in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. It has 375 branches and 1,001 ATMs throughout Pennsylvania. It also operates 12 retail branches and 95 ATMs in southern New Jersey, and a commercial loan office and 15 ATMs in Virginia. It is a subsidiary of RBS Citizens Financial Group, Inc., a $126 billion commercial bank holding company headquartered in Providence, R.I.

RBS Citizens Financial Group through its subsidiaries has approximately 1,400 branches, more than 3,600 ATMs and nearly 19,000 colleagues. Its two bank subsidiaries are RBS Citizens, N.A., and Citizens Bank of Pennsylvania. They operate a 12-state branch network under the Citizens Bank brand in Connecticut, Delaware, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Vermont; and the Charter One brand in Illinois, Michigan and Ohio. RBSCFG has non-branch retail and commercial offices in more than 30 states. RBSCFG is owned by RBS (the Royal Bank of Scotland Group plc). RBSCFG’s website is citizensbank.com.