October 2018 NewsLETTER
TOASTMASTERS PIN DAY FRIDAY OCTOBER 19
Wear your pin and badge! Wear all your pins!!!!
As we join with District 72 to celebrate the birth of Toastmasters by Ralph Smedley in October 94 years ago.
(above) The District 112 Public Relations Manager taking things to extremes as usual, will be wearing his for a week.
(It works, as your editor claims he already has 4 followers, two appear to medics from the local clinic, and two cops!!!!)
Let’s make sure this NEWS LETTER gets to your Members and share the moment, so they can be informed of what is taking place on their behalf at District level.
District Director – Greetings members of District 112
We are now through the first quarter of our Toastmasters year. Gosh, where has the time gone?
At the end of September the majority of our 163 clubs had paid their subs to Toastmasters International. Thank you! Doing this enables not only your members to actively continue with Pathways but also the Club Officers to maintain access to Club Central for conducting club business. As at the date I write, 2nd October, there are still 16 clubs that need to renew their membership payments in order to keep both the club and members in good standing.
On Saturday 29th September we held our very first “Virtual Council” meeting as was dictated by Toastmasters International. This council meeting was held in order to confirm the appointment of District Officers and also to present and vote on the adoption of the District 112 Budget for the 2018-19 year.
Club Presidents, Vice Presidents Education and District Officers were all invited to attend. In order to have a quorum present it was necessary for 109 Club President and VP Education to be present and vote. We were thrilled that 129 Club Officers were able to attend and therefore our District business was able to be completed in a positive timely manner.
I would like to publicly acknowledge our Programme Quality Director Neil Stichbury for all of his incredible efforts in bringing the Virtual Meeting to fruition. Without his extensive technical knowledge and expertise this process may not have run nearly as smoothly as it did. Thank you Neil.
I would also like to formally thank our District Parliamentarian Chrissy Meyer, and Frank of course, for opening their home to us to act as a base point for the meeting to be held. The teamwork that takes place in Toastmasters is simply incredible. As a side note, if you have never stepped outside of your club to Area, Division or District level events, I strongly encourage you to do so. I tell everyone that it is not until you step outside of your own club that you really experience what a family Toastmasters is.
I will sign off at this point as there is more vital information that needs to be shared by others in this newsletter edition. So, take care! Relish the energy that spring brings to us all and I look forward to giving you an update again this time next month.
Toastfully yours
Toni Sharp QSM DTM
Program Quality Director – Neil Stichbury DTM
It was great to see the inaugural Virtual District Council Meeting go well, and thank you for the feedback received. One issue was that some members found their voting and other emails in their ‘junk/spam’ mail boxes. If you are expecting emails it is always a good idea to check there.
We really appreciate all Club Presidents and Vice Presidents Education, District Officers and Past District Governors and Directors who were able to give of their Saturday afternoon to assist us to achieve a quorum (club representatives) and successfully complete the business session required.
We are never still in Toastmasters, there is always something going on. While preparing that next speech we will also be looking at what will be presented in the next round of Club Leadership Training. We have a core curriculum to present and are more than happy to receive representations from clubs as to what they would like to see in terms of optional training areas. Please make it your club goal to have seven officers attend training. Your club will benefit.
Some clubs will also be running contests now and in the coming weeks through to the end of the calendar year. Contests are a stretch goal, give them a go! – Neil
Club Growth Director – Sharon Kerr-Phillips DTM
Congratulations to everyone for working hard to promote membership thereby strengthening and growing our District 112 clubs.
A big thank you to Kingsley Moody for personally delivering the billboards throughout the District and to our Area Directors for assisting with the erection of these billboards. The billboards raise the profile of Toastmasters throughout the District and we have already had both phone and text responses from them. The photos you have sent of them have been much appreciated. Please continue sending these through to us, as we are looking to use these in upcoming marketing initiatives.
Thanks to those clubs who have advised the quantity of Visitor’s Brochures you would ideally like to receive. Should you not have advised your Area Director yet, it would be appreciated if you could please do as soon as possible, that includes indicating if your club will not be needing the brochures.
A big round of applause to the members who assisted at the NZMA Careers Expo. This was a most successful event with six pages of expressions of interest being received, as well as the potential to start new clubs and a Youth Leadership programme. Our PRM is collating these leads and will be sending them to you soon.
A big thanks to the members involved in the Corporate Breakfast, your input was much appreciated. Valuable leads were gained from this breakfast.
Who is looking for the opportunity to gain even more from Toastmasters than you are already? Coaching, mentoring or sponsoring a club is an incredible experience and is the ideal opportunity to grow and extend yourself even further. We have clubs in need of a club coach, as well as a few clubs in formation wanting to start. We would welcome expressions of interest. Please do not hesitate to contact me on 021 059 9897 or d112clubgrowth@toastmasters.org.nz. (I am aware there were a few emails that bounced back from this address recently. I am pleased to advise this issue has now been resolved. Please do contact me if you have recently sent an email to which I have not responded).
We are also working on a few membership projects which has created the opportunity for High Performance Leadership projects. Please contact me should you be interested. We would of course welcome any membership growth initiatives from you too.
Please contact me should you be interested in applying for promotional funding. We have some funding available to support clubs in formation and clubs with lower membership, as well as a level of funding available for existing club promotional activities.
Congratulations to Rodney Lewis, for his 25 years of dedication to Dynamic Diners Toastmasters. Rodney has been a member of Toastmasters for 33 year, his dedication and commitment is much appreciated.
We will be promoting Toastmasters at the NZ Business Women’s Conference on the 26th – 27th of October at the Ellerslie Event Centre. Please contact me if you would like to be involved with this.
Looking forward to receiving photos from you to include in our next newsletter.
All the best for October, let’s continue empowering our members and guests to grow in confidence and unleash their potential.
Sharon Kerr-Phillips DTM
Testimonial – My Toastmasters Journey
Hello, my name is Carolyn and I have been a member of Toastmasters since July 2015. People often ask me what attracted me to Toastmasters and therefore I thought I would share my story. I am blind and have a lovely guide dog named Imogen. I was looking for an activity in my local community where I could meet more local people and widen my circle of friends. Toastmasters is an organisation I had heard of and I have friends who are members, so I decided to check it out. I started visiting the Maungakiekie club and instantly felt welcome and that this was a club where I could feel at home in.
I also like the provisions in the Toastmasters rules that make it easy for blind and vision impaired members to participate fully in a club and in competitions. As I worked my way through the Competent communicator Manual I took the chance to introduce my club members to Braille, my love of books and my passion for organ donation just to mention a few. I also took on the challenge of various roles within the club during our meetings and had the most fun being the timer, especially when my mentor went overtime it was fun buzzing him. Maungakiekie has been very supportive of me and willing to let me try everything. I told them upon joining just give me all the required roles and if there is a problem we can work it out together and this has worked wonderfully well.
Since joining toastmasters I have taken up being a public speaker for the Blind foundation. Visiting schools and other community groups to talk about being blind and the work of guide dogs.
I also work for Dans le Noir Auckland which is the dine in the dark experience, where customers come for the experience of dining in complete darkness and being served by blind staff. Recently many of our districts top ranked Toastmasters came for an evening there and it was my pleasure to let them experience a little of my world.
I have loved my time in Toastmasters and competing in competitions. I would really recommend it to anyone who wants a new challenge and you just never know where it could take you.
Carolyn Peat
Speak to you next month – more testimonials needed – Send to