We had a wonderful meeting on Friday with Sunrise members advancing their skills along the Toastmasters Pathways educational program. Guests are always welcome to see if the benefits of a structured communication and leadership would help them achieve their goals, as it does for our dedicated members.
The Vice President of Education, Karen Rhodes, opened the meeting by reciting a poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow titled Decoration Day to promote thoughtful reflection during the following moment of silence in respect for the Black Lives Matter movement at the one year anniversary of George Floyd’s murder.
The Toastmaster, Tim Murphy, then established the theme for the meeting of travel, and introduced the word of the day, nomad. The first speaker was Dustin Johnson who is working through the Dynamic Leadership pathway, with a project on Evaluation and Feedback. In his speech, The Drifter, Dustin reminded us all to remember what’s-important-now (W-I-N) by staying focused, without giving in to distractions from our goals. Dustin’s use of props, humor, and analogies helped drive home his points with emphasis. Thank you Dustin for leading us down (and keeping us on) the right path!The second speaker was Kelsey Long, who is working through the Innovative Planning pathway, with a project on Researching and Presenting. For her speech titled, Sunrise Toastmasters, Meet Dr. Dan!, Kelsey told us of the life of the first successful heart surgeon, Dr. Daniel Hale Williams. Having had heart surgery performed on her as a baby, Kelsey felt she was exposed to more than average amount of knowledge in the field, but had never heard of Dr. Dan. As it happens, Dr. Dan also founded the first non-segregated hospital in the United States, and an associated nursing school for African Americans. He also co-founded the National Medical Association, and was the only African-American doctor in the American of Surgeons. He died in relative obscurity, although his accomplishments were astounding. Thank you Kelsey for sharing his story, and how we are all so connected.
Table Topics was run by Anu Parvathaneni with an interesting prompt to assign random items from a magazine, and ask each responder to give a successful sales pitch for the item assigned to them. General Evaluations were lead by Dave Burr, and his team of Savannah, Marlit, Summer, and Angela.
As always, it seemed impossible that so much knowledge was packed into a one hour meeting and presented so effectively. Don’t you wish more meetings in your life could be run with that level of efficiency and respect for your time? They can, and it starts with you. Come join a Toastmasters meeting and see if what we do is a good fit for you!
