Military Appreciation Month Spotlight: Park Ridge Resident Dennis Frantsve

Dennis Frantsve of Park Ridge has been a member of the Marines for 23 years, 13 of which were spent in active duty; he currently serves as a Marine Corps reservist. In 2004, he deployed with the 22nd marine expeditionary unit to Afghanistan for about five months. Despite flying in and around some of the worst terrain on the planet, Frantsve says he wouldn’t trade the experience for anything as it was an absolute honor to serve his country.

In 2007, he left active duty, completed graduate school at the University of Chicago and started his career at Bank of America, where he now helps manage relationships with leading institutional investors served by Bank of America Merrill Lynch. At Bank of America, he also co-leads the Chicago chapter of the bank’s Military Support and Assistance Group (MSAG), which provides support and development opportunities for military employees and their families. Through his MSAG work, Dennis also leads partnership and corporate giving opportunities with Chicagoland veteran nonprofits, including Hines Fisher House, USO-IL, National ABLE, Rush’s Road Home Program and The Bunker @ 1871.

Prior to working in Chicago, Frantsve worked in Bank of America’s New York office, where he was heavily involved in the local MSAG chapter and helped spearhead the group’s veteran initiatives, such as its partnership with Veterans on Wall Street.

Now working in Chicago, his tie to the New York veteran community continues as Frantsve acts as a final round interviewer for the office’s very successful internship program for veterans. Since the program started to now, 21 veterans have been offered internships at the bank through this program. Frantsve has seen firsthand how successful and rewarding this program is for veterans and hopes to create a similar program in Chicago.

As an avid runner, Frantsve also is able to make a personal connection with the military community by running the Bank of America Chicago Marathon. In 2014, he ran his third Chicago Marathon, where he was able to help support MSAG in its continued partnership with the Freedom Team of Wounded Veterans who were also participating in the Marathon. The team is made up of disabled veterans returned from Iraq and Afghanistan and trained by the nonprofit organization, Achilles International. Through this partnership with Achilles International, the Marathon becomes a weekend event for Frantsve, were he is able to meet the team and welcome them to Chicago.

Through Frantsve’s efforts and in many other ways Bank of America gives back to service members and their families. In fact, Bank of America has provided banking services to the U.S. military for more than 90 years and employs more than 7,000 veterans, Guard and Reservists. Five thousand bank employees are members of MSAG chapters across the country.

For these reasons and more, Frantsve is proud to work at the bank: “I’m loyal to Bank of America because they take good care of me and of veterans in general.”