Hello, Toastmasters! I think we might be able to describe this past Thursday’s meeting as “record breaking”. We had eight guests, seven guests participated in our Table Topics session, we had four Ice Breaker speeches, and four guests joined after the meeting. I’m sure there has to be at least one club record broken in there somewhere!
Members Present: Tom Alvord, Jay Broderick, Jennifer Cimilluca, Walter Diaz, Siva Digavalli, Charnaie Gordon, Kay Jeyapalan, John Keppler, Cheryl Mason, Pam Mulready, Michael Nicastre, Sally Nicastre, Ramesh Padavala, Murali Pemmaraju, Eric Roise, Rob Schaff, Jeannette White.
Guests: Anthony Elder, Erik Jarboe (a former member), Cristina Johnson, Frances Ocansey, Fred Payen, Amanda Roczniak, Jose Sanchez, Gary Torello. After the meeting, Anthony, Cristina, and Gary joined (and Erik rejoined) the club!
Business Meeting: Charnaie gave an overview of our club’s 2010-2011 theme, “Branch Out” and explained the Distinguished Club Program. Our club has earned DCP status in each of the last five years, and we have two points already so far (out of a possible ten).
Our next meeting (August 12th) will be held at the Village at South Farms, 645 Saybrook Road. August 26th’s meeting location is Luther Ridge at 628 Congdon Street West. We will be back at Middlesex Community College on September 9th.
On September 9th, we will have a special guest speaker. Jerry Theodorou, a trained opera singer, will be giving us techniques on how we can more effectively use our voices.
Our new coordinator of the mentoring program, Pam, spoke on the revitalized mentoring program. Anyone interested in assisting her on the mentoring committee, being a mentor, or being mentored, should see Pam.
Kay was our Toastmaster for the evening. She spoke about the Competent Communicator manual, which has ten speech projects that can be completed in any order. She mentioned some of the obstacles that we face in completing the manual, and offered tips to overcome them. If the obstacle is shyness, taking on other roles (Ah Counter, Timer) can help. If time is the obstacle, take a few minutes each day to prepare a speech. If choosing a topic is the obstacle, bounce ideas off your spouse, family member, a colleague, or a more experienced club members. Many thanks to Kay for these excellent suggestions. She also reminded us that taking a role in the fall contest can be used for credit in the Competent Leadership manual.
Siva presented the Word of the Day, “profligate”, which means wildly extravagant and wasteful.
In her invocation, Pam reminded us how privileged we are to have this time to improve ourselves through public speaking.
Our guest Humorist, Anthony, gave us three hilarious stories that really got us laughing.
Our Table Topics Master, Cheryl, gave “Getting to Know You Questions” to Erik, Cristina, Fred, Amanda, Gary, Jose, and Frances. It was really great to have so many guests participate in Table Topics!
Prepared Speeches: Four out of our five speeches were Ice Breakers and they were incredible! Eric’s speech was evaluated by Charnaie, Jeanette’s was evaluated by Pam, Siva’s speech was evaluated by Rob, and Walter’s was evaluated by Tom. Murali gave his 8th speech, and was evaluated by John. Two more speeches and Murali earns his CC!
The General Evaluator was Ramesh. Jay was our Timer, our Grammarian was Sally, and our Ah Counter was Michael.
Guest comments: Anthony said he was “glad to be here”
Frances said she “will be coming back”
Jose said he “had a good time; makes me want to come back”
Fred said he “will be back”
Amanda said it was “interesting” and that she “liked the Table Topics”
Cristina also said she enjoyed Table Topics
Gary said it was “educational, entertaining, will be back”
Erik said he was “happy to be back”
Kay gave Ice Breaker candies to Eric, Jeanette, Siva, and Walter, and congratulated them again on their excellent speeches.
The meeting concluded at 9:10pm.
Please advise any errors or omissions.
Respectfully submitted,
Jennifer Cimilluca, Secretary
Middlesex County Toastmasters Club
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