Mark, as VPE and true to form, brought fun to the evening with the theme “space travel”, and as Grammarian, asked that we use the word “spaghettification” as often as possible. Joyce continued the unexpected in her Warm Up by situating us all in a space ship on its way to “save the Ewoks” (or some such mission), and inviting us to share what, if anything, was going through our heads.
President Elaine had a particularly busy meeting. She started by inducting our newest member Gerry, and then went on to conduct the election of our next executive who will take office on July 1. (Seven executive officers take care of money, correspondence, properties, membership, PR, and training/ education). Later still Elaine announced the choice of Glenn to be Area Director for a second year.
Inductions and elections remind us of the opportunities and the obligations we each have while doing our bit to keep the show on the road. This includes those attracted to the leadership path in Toastmasters, a path which begins in a club and goes via Area (Coffs and Jetty clubs), Division, District, and Region (Australasia) to its endpoint at International where a different person each year presides over 16,200 clubs in 145 countries, with about 364,000 members all told*. (*Wikipedia).
There were two main speakers. Barbara spoke about the critical importance of evaluation for improvement in public speaking. Next, in her “icebreaker”, Gerry described how her passion for environmentalism interlocks with the work she does and her motivation to improve as a public speaker. I’m guessing this link between work and public speaking skills resonated with many of us.
President Elaine was back on her feet after supper to progress arrangements for our debate with Coffs Rotary next month. It is now confirmed that the topic will be “Aliens are living amongst us”. Coffs club will argue for the affirmative, and our three speakers will be Elaine, Melissa, and Mike.
Next meetings:
Coffs Harbour – Tuesday June 7.
Jetty Speakers – Thursday May 26.