Minutes from Friday, June 13, 2025
Sunrise Toastmasters
This week’s meeting started with a warm welcome from our Vice President of Education (VPE), Toastmaster Abdulrahman Albazie with comments on the premise that injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere, and being thankful for this group of Toastmasters that he feels pushes for a more equitable future. This led us into our moment of silence in recognition of the Black Lives Matter movement and the ongoing struggle for racial equality. The introduction was concluded with reminders such as use of the bias flag as a tool toward becoming more conscientious speakers before turning the meeting over to our Toastmaster of the Day, Toastmaster Matthew Choate who led us through a round of introductions and celebration of new members before introducing our word of the day, “cadence” with the meaning of beat or time. Matthew related it to cycling and pedal stroke as well as in a broader sense to the work place and in public speaking.
Toastmaster Anu Parvatheni introduced our first speaker, Toastmaster Kerstin Haase who spoke on “Leadership with Purpose” and the importance of the democratic process, leading us into completion of annual club business, the election of the next year’s officers and the club goal of representing continuing to be a nurturing environment. The next year’s officers are Abdulrahman (President), Toastmaster Bettina Ross (VPE), Toastmaster Tim Murphy (Vice President of Membership), Toastmaster Summer Murphy (Vice President of Public Relations), Toastmaster Savvy Murphy (Treasurer), Toastmasters Norris Bass (Sergeant at Arms), and Toastmaster Kendra Hiatt (Secretary). We are all thankful for Kerstin’s leadership through the past year!
Toastmaster Stiles Burr introduced our second speaker, Norris who’s 5-7 minute talk was titled “Alexx’s Services”. He related how he his family had learned of the Innovation and Waiver Program one evening while dining in one of their favorite places, Mr. Gattis’ Pizza. They learned of this from another family with a special needs child and how this had been able to help them keep working, offer guidance in qualifying for needed services as well as programs for their child. Norris expressed his thankfulness for that evening, noted that Alexx had quickly been accepted into the program, and related that today there is a 10+ year waiting list! He concluded by citing the importance of public awareness of these types of programs and the understanding of their need.
Table Topics was led by Tina Joe, who centered her questions around our word of the day. Anu shared that her musical theme song would have a Zumba music genre because it energizes her. Toastmaster (as of ~0645 this morning!) Lucretia Abasto expressed joining Toastmasters as was one of the ways she was trying to align her daily actions with her inner cadence, to step outside her comfort zone and grow. Toastmaster Dave Burr noted his methodical approach to the day was his unique cadence and contributed to his authenticity. Abdulrahman described his choice to pivot from being a mechanical engineer, and instead going into consulting as a decision he has been happy with and example of how he walked to the beat of his own drum. Our guest Kehinde Eniola expressed her desire to be a leader instead of a follower as the manner in which she identified with her inner cadence against the noise of the outside world.
We then moved onto the Breakfast of Champions, speech and meeting evaluations. Kendra served as our General Evaluator, turning it over to Anu to complete Speaker 1 evaluation and then to Stiles to complete Speaker 2 evaluation. Toastmaster Kim Robinson and Summer filled the roles of Grammarian and Timer.
Food for thought:
We speak to be remembered and repeated (Patricia Fripp).
We are a but a tiny piece of…
Friday, June 20: no meeting in honor of Juneteenth
Roles for Friday, June 27 are as follows:
Toastmaster: Tina Joe
Speaker 1: Abdulrahman
Speaker 2: Kerstin
Table Topics: Anu
Gen Evaluator: Dave
Evaluator 1: Tim
Evaluator 2: Tim
Timer: Kim
Grammarian: < open >
