Photo Provided Pictured from left to right is Silas Blount, Zane Archer, Mason Briggs, Unified Senior Commercial Banking Executive Michael Goclan, Kaiden Baker, and Peyden Graham.

MARTINS FERRY — The Boy Scout motto is “Be Prepared,” and a local bank has a team teaching precisely that.

Unified Bank lenders Michael Goclan and Stacy Carpino are helping area Scouts (boys and girls) prepare for their futures by offering financial literacy training to allow the Scouts to earn their Personal Management Merit Badges.

Merit badges are designed to allow Scouts to learn and understand subjects to help them determine if they would like to pursue them further as a career or vocation. They also give Scouts a basic understanding of life lessons to further their personal development. There are 135 merit badges in the Boy Scouts of America education system.

Goclan and Carpino will be offering merit badge training for the coveted Scout’s Personal Merit Badge, a badge designed to train Scouts on how to map out a plan for life that includes short- and long-range goals and ways to reach those goals. Goclan, an Eagle Scout and father of two Eagle Scout sons, said he believes today’s youth face difficult financial decisions that will best be made with early education and an understanding of money, credit, savings and financial planning.

“It’s important that young people enter adulthood with a firm understanding of finances and how bank accounts work and can help them,” Goclan said. “I’m grateful Unified Bank and Scouting can come together to allow me to help our future leaders learn and grow financially.”

Goclan’s Personal Management Merit Badge workshops will be held at Belmont College from 12:15-2 p.m. Feb. 17 and from 12:30-2:30 p.m. March 23 with a final session and lunch being held April 13 at Unified Bank in Martins Ferry. The workshops are available to all qualifying Scouts. Those interested in attending can call the Boy Scouts of America Ohio River Council at 304-277-2660.

Unified Bank is a full-service Member FDIC-insured, state-chartered commercial bank headquartered in Martins Ferry and has 18 locations that serve the Ohio counties of Athens, Belmont, Carroll, Fairfield, Harrison, Hocking, Jefferson and Tuscarawas and Marshall County in West Virginia. Unified Bank is the sole operating subsidiary of United Bancorp Inc., a publicly traded bank holding company, and has been serving the financial needs of the Ohio Valley since 1902.