Welcome to a New Year!

Hello Everyone - It is my honour to be able to report to the members of Bolton Banter Toastmasters as the Webmaster and now Club President.  Our first meeting of the new Toastmasters year was held on July 15th and I'm anticipating another year filled with achievements for both club members and the club as a whole. 

First time Chair Alan Keyes welcomed guests Biron and the new area 15 governor, Neil Matheson.   Alan's theme and word of the meeting were "mindset" and "growth/fixed" respectively.  "Mindset" is the name of a book that asks, "is your mind fixed or open for growth?"  Ideally we should aim for growth. 

Table Topics Master Jim DeCarolis chose, not surprisingly,  the theme of vacation for tonight's series of mini speeches.  It seems we all have differing ideas regarding the ideal vacation.  Imagine not liking beaches!!!

It's always a special meeting when we have an icebreaker and tonight we had the pleasure of hearing Karina Garcia's first speech.  Karina spoke of her childhood memories and her family's emigration from Peru in 1981.  She offered a snapshot of her life experiences and described her life today which includes, among other things, a love for music. 

Eric Solowka, speaking from "The Discussion Leader", an advanced manual, asked the question, "how do people of different personality styles communicate?".  Are you an extrovert or an introvert?  How do you make decisions?  How do we take in information?  He had us actually doing an exercise and provided hand outs to complement his very interesting and thoughtful presentation. 

We all learned much from Karina and Eric.  Thank you both very much. 

Since this was my first meeting as President, I outlined what my hopes for the year include and high on the list is another ribbon to signify that our club is a President's Distinguished Club for yet another year.  The Distinguished Club Program, known informally as the DCP, is very important for both club and individual goals and the club's VP Education, Eric Solowka, will be speaking about it throughout the year.  I plan also to stress the importance of the Competent Leader program and to ensure that club members have as many educational opportunities as possible during the course of regular meetings.  What you learn in Toastmasters is transferable to every corner of your life and I, along with the executive, plan to show how Toastmasters experiences can help you with the every day challenges you face at work, home, the community, social settings or volunteer work. Please feel free at any time to speak to me or any member of the executive about your own ideas for training and education. 

The meeting concluded with the presentation of an ice breaker pin to Karina.  We look forward to hearing from her again soon. 

Under normal circumstances, the fifth Thursday of the month is treated as a special and not a regular club meeting.  However, since the first Thursday, July 1st, was a statutory holiday, there was no meeting that day.  In order to ensure that the month of July has two regular meetings with speaking and role opportunities for members the executive proposed and the members present (there being quorum) agreed that the fifth Thursday of July, that is, July 29th, would be treated as a regular meeting .  See you all then.  Hope you are enjoying the summer thus far.  Cheers and regards -

Lorraine Van Wagner, Webmaster and President