Simply Speaking Minutes

Colorado Community Church

11/1/2012

It was a meeting filled with several milestones Thursday night.  Joel Weissman stepped in as Toastmaster for the first time and Joe Long took over as Sergeant-at-Arms.

The theme was “Staying the Course” and the word of the day was “Resilience” – the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties, toughness.

The meeting got under way with Margaret Seyer leading us in the pledge of allegiance and reminding us to turn off our phones.

Pete Hazlet delivered the inspiration for the evening, a quote from James Arthur Baldwin.

Speeches got under way with Maura Thompson delivering her 10th speech, qualifying her for her Competent Communicate award.  She very cleverly tied this speech to her icebreaker, telling us a little about herself, still too competitive, unconventional, a leader, and about her restored confidence.  She provided an update, telling us she accomplished this because of Simply Speaking.  Congratulations, Maura!

Connie Akins delivered her speech titled “Many Hands Make Light Work”, from Success/Leadership projects.  Her speech focused on teamwork and she brought in audience participation, a great example of teamwork.  Connie informed us that we are all leaders, developing our own skills, reminding us that Toastmasters is where leaders are made.  With audience participation several tenets of leadership were listed, as well as some of the challenges leaders face.  It was a great speech with lots of information, thanks Connie!

With Connie's speech being 15 minutes we only had two tonight.

Cybele Antonow led table topics and had some great questions for the participants.  Great responses from our  participants included Joy Davidson, who told us her favorite role is the speaker.  Leo Chen prefers the communication track to help him develop leadership skills and Darryle Brown told us that in 2014 he is up on the stage at the International Speech Contest.

Kathy Fortune was our timer for the evening.  She reported that everyone was in time.

General Evaluator Will Osagiede evaluated the meeting, which had started on time, was exciting, and stayed on course.  He also introduced Kumu Kandaswamy, the evaluator for Maura’s speech.  He also mentioned that this was Joel’s first time as the Toastmaster.

Kumu told Maura that it was a fascinating speech.  She especially liked how Maura tied her first speech and her tenth speech together.

Will congratulated Kumu on a great evaluation and said she speaks from the heart.

Ah Counter Darryle Brown who did and who didn't have any filler words or “ah’s”, etc and Grammarian

Diane Nuss told us the word of the day was used only twice.

Quizmaster Leo Chen tested our listening skills by asking what people said in their speeches and in table topics.

Joel handed out the following awards:
Table Topics: Leo Chen
Evaluator: Kumu Kandaswamy
Speaker: Maura Thompson

President Cybele Antonow closed the meeting and reminded us to bring something for the basket for the humorous speech contest.

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