First meeting in new room at UC room 7A51

First meeting in our new room The new meeting room we have been assigned (7A51) is much larger than the Boardroom at Building 15, and at the moment this part of Building 7 is quiet during our meeting time. Most of us found the room before start time of 12.30, and once everyone was present there were 12 of us. We had three visitors: Ward Penman, as well as Karina and Linda. Ward explained the purpose of his visit. He is a Toastmasters Ambassador at present, one of several who are going to all clubs to outline a new program currently being devised. Its designers aim to deal with new (and old) challenges noted with the current first-stage program and its dual streams of ‘competent communication’ and ‘competent leadership’. So many Toastmasters now carry everything on their tablets and phones that the new program is being adapted for use on them too! However, non-tablet-savvy people will be able to use the printed manuals if they choose to. We also enjoyed two speeches by club members. Dominic tackled a controversial topic in a non-controversial way, through talking about reactions to the pros and cons of gay marriage as discussed within his own family. By distancing us, the audience, because we are not in his family, he was able to outline a range of personal, community and extreme responses that can crop up when this topic is raised, without generating any heated reactions in this room. The talk was well structured and fluent, used good presentation techniques (gestures, stance, vocal range, eye contact, etc.), and left us with something to think about. Sandy’s 7 minutes were devoted to a practice version of a longer speech she must give soon to an influential audience. Sandy was fortunate that Ward, an extremely experienced Toastmaster, was her evaluator. His comments will be very helpful as she prepares her actual presentation. There was time for just five table topics questions, posed this week by Carmen. They were all interesting questions. These were: Which is worse, failure or never trying?, Telling little white lies is OK?, Remember the the first time you ever used a computer?, Would you break the law to save a loved one?, and , what would you do differently if you knew nobody would judge you? Such interesting topics make the meeting interesting. Next meeting, 21 February, will be our internal club contests, assuming we have more than one contestant for the two sections: International Speech, and Evaluation. See you there.