NEW EMPLOYEES

Laurel Elizabeth Adkisson has joined Commerce Bank in Cape Girardeau as senior financial services representatives and Timothy M. Sievers of Jackson has joined the bank as a vice president in the loan department.

Adkisson, a graduate of East Prairie High School and Southeast Missouri State University with a degree in marketing-management, previously served as marketing coordinator for the Cape Girardeau Convention and Visitors Bureau. She worked six years in sales management with the Holiday Inn in Cape Girardeau.

Her job responsibilities include customer development, new accounts, student loan programs and senior partners activities.

Adkisson is a member of the Zonta Club, River Heritage Association and Chamber of Commerce. She has served on the Cape Girardeau Public Library Foundation Board and on the American Cancer Society Board of Directors.

Adkisson and her husband, Christopher Adkisson, reside in Cape Girardeau.

Sievers worked at Jackson Exchange Bank for nine years in consumer and agriculture lending. More recently he was branch manager of the Farm Credit of Southeast Missouri office at Jackson.

Sievers is a graduate of the University of Missouri-Columbia with a degree in agriculture.

Sievers, his wife, Judy, and children, Jimmy, 10, and Travis, 4, reside west of Jackson.

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Kara Finley has joined the Academy of Dancearts as an instructor of ballet, tap dance and jazz.

Finley is a graduate of Stephens College in Columbia, with a bachelor of arts degree in dance.

While at Stephens, she studied ballet, tap, jazz, modern, Spanish and African dance as well as courses in choreography, including anatomy for dancers and dance history.

She performed three years in the Stephens Faculty Concert and was a choreographer for the students choreography concert.

Finley, a native of Ironton, is a graduate of Arcadia Valley High School. She started her dance training at the O'Dells Dance Studio in Desloge, where she studied eight years.

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Rod Sievers has been appointed executive producer of "Heartland News" at KFVS-12.

Mike Beecher, news director, announced Sievers' appointment.

Prior to joining KFVS-12, Sievers was a news anchor and producer at WSIL-TV in Carterville, Ill., for more than six years. He started his broadcasting career in radio and served as news director for two Southern Illinois radio stations.

In his new position, he will oversee many of the activities in the newsroom.

Sievers holds a bachelor of science degree in radio and TV from Southern Illinois University-Carbondale.

Sievers and his family reside in Carterville.