Bank of Romney

with school supplies.” The bank also organizes a Financial Scholar’s Program that they have run in both local high schools for the past seven years. Students are taught different aspects of financial literacy including balancing a check book, saving, the difference between renting and borrowing, budgeting, consumer skills, insurance and more. “We give them the different banking basics to give them a highlight of what they need to know financially to survive once they graduate, whether they go to college or not,” Young says. “That’s important to us as a bank because about 70 percent of our employees actually end up coming from the local high schools. So, we are not only giving them that product, we’re educating our future employment group. And probably even more of them come down here and need a house loan or a car loan, so the more we educate them about how to deal with their finances, the better customers they’ll be and the less likely it is that they’ll have problems with paying the loans back, which in turn helps us and our income.” The Bank of Romney’s 85 employees are also encouraged to get involved in their community. “We are very family oriented and we take our employees needs into consideration,” Carl says. “They are in community activities and parades and they seem to be very involved in their community, whether it’s their church or clubs or things their children are doing – and we encourage that.” That community spirit and compassion for the needs of their staff has developed a warm and optimistic corporate culture within the bank. Employees range from ones hired in the past week to those who started back in the 1970s. “We have a lot of flexibility here for the employees to pick up their children in school and that type of thing,” says Young. “We’ve had several employees that have left and gone to other places and often they want to come back