Black Swan March 2018
From the Editor's Desk
Welcome to the March 2018 edition of the Black Swan, a newsletter for District 17 Toastmasters.
Keep up to date with what is happening in your district. In this edition you can find out who has achieved education awards for February, learn about current membership-building competitions, exciting progress with Gavel clubs, and how one club is handling gaps in Pathways. Don't forget to purchase your ticket to Follow your Path to Rendezvous - our District convention in May!
Jeremy del Pino
Black Swan Editor
We encourage articles from members, this newsletter is 'written by Toastmasters, for Toastmasters'. Refer to Guidelines for authors and how to submit.
District Director News
by Sue Fallon
Hello District 17 Members
Division Club Growth Coordinators
- Their role is to work with our members towards starting New Clubs, and providing Sponsors & Mentors.
- To offer support to clubs who need some assistance or a Coach.
Their coverage of the role will continue to the end of June 2018. Please give them a call if you need some assistance or can offer to help them in one of the above mentioned roles.
Central Division – Kevin Sansome – sansomek@gmail.com – 0401 987 739
Eastern Division – Robyn Lloyd – robynltm@optusnet.com.au – 0402 811 652
Northern Division – Henry Yau – hyau1964@hotmail.com – 0437 457 396
Pathways our members are starting to show more take up with the Pathways program. Terrific to see the achievements are already being highlighted in Patricia’s monthly report.
I hope that a few more of you have logged in and had a look at the program. You do not have to start on the journey as yet – but I hope you soon will. Whichever path you choose to continue, the district is behind each and every member, and here to assist you’re in reaching your goals.
Club Award Progress - Well done to the 31 Clubs who provisionally meet Distinguished status or greater in the district. The result will become official after the 2nd round of renewals are completed by HQ during April 2018.
Contestants & Club Treasurers - Please keep in mind that members who are competing are required to be members in good standing of a club in good standing.
If you’re Area or Division Contests are after 1 April 2018 – please ensure your contestants have paid their dues to the club and that the club has paid the dues to Toastmaster International.
Good luck to all of our contestants over the next couple of months!
Sue Fallon
District Director 2017-2918
District 17
Secure your Convention Early Bird Tickets
Now on Sale for $305!
Have you booked your ticket for the upcoming District 17 Annual Convention? The first Early Bird tickets sold out in record time, so we have released second Early Bird tickets for $305. There are only 28 tickets left at this price which ends 31st March.
The Convention will be held at the Rendezvous Hotel, Scarborough May 25 – 27 May 2018. Don’t delay any further. Visit the District 17 Convention website for further details and program.
Membership Renewals
by Sue Fallon
Club Officers, now is the time to collect dues from your members and submit semi-annual payments to World Headquarters.
Lodge your first 8 payments with World Headquarters to meet the minimum requirement for the Distinguished Club Program (DCP).
I recommend you lodge the remaining payments as you receive them (note transaction fees are the same whether you lodge one renewal or a batch).
The Toastmasters International website may experience heavy traffic as over 16,000 clubs from around the world submit their dues this month, so avoid the rush and submit payments early! All payments MUST be submitted by 31st March.
If your club uses a Free ToastHost website, the club treasurer can use the Dues Management page to send invoices, track payments, note if members have paid an annual amount and send reminder notices for unpaid dues.
Lodging payments on time is extremely important for the upcoming contest season as all contestants and judges must be in ‘Good Standing in a club of Good Standing’. This means payments must be lodged with World Headquarters before the 31st March and not sitting in a club’s bank account.
Sue Fallon
District Director 2017-2918
District 17
February Education Awards
by Patricia D'Cruze
In February 2018, members in District 17 achieved 29 educational awards.
We had 6 Pathways awards submitted with Ross Wilkinson leading the charge with 3 Pathways awards (2 Level 1 awards and 1 Level 2 award). Almarie Meyer, Tom Bielski, Marty O'Connor and Ian Pickens who completed Level 1 in Pathways. Congratulations and well done on taking the lead as a Pathways Champion in your club.
We had 23 educational awards completed in the ‘traditional’ program – 8 Competent Communicator awards, 9 Advanced Communicator Bronze, 5 Competent Leader and 1 HPL Award.
| Award | Date | Member | Club |
| Pathways | |||
| INNPLAL1 | 26TH Feb 2018 | Ian A. Pickens | City of Perth Toastmasters Club |
| PERINFL1 | 7th Feb 2018 | Ross Phillip Wilkinson | Leading Lights Toastmasters |
| PREMASL1 | 27th Feb 2018 | Martin J. O'Connor | Inspiring Speakers Toastmasters Club |
| PREMASL1 | 7th Feb 2018 | Ross Phillip Wilkinson | Leading Lights Toastmasters |
| VISCOML1 | 21st Feb 2018 | Almarie Meyer | Butler Toastmasters Club |
| VISCOML1 | 3rd Feb 2018 | Tom Bielski | Sunday Sundowners Toastmasters Club |
| Competent Communicator | |||
| CC | 28th Feb 2018 | Martin J. O'Connor | Inspiring Speakers Toastmasters Club |
| CC | 26TH Feb 2018 | Jarrad Mahon | Cannington Communicators |
| CC | 17th Feb 2018 | Mark Henry | Bunbury Club |
| CC | 12th Feb 2018 | Caroline Devenish-Meares | Fremantle Quaynote Speakers |
| CC | 2/09/2018 | Binod Kumar Agarwalla | City of Cockburn Toastmasters |
| CC | 8th Feb 2018 | Colin Gan | Canning Vale Toastmasters |
| CC | 6th Feb 2018 | Gladys Doreen Lavell | Swan Toastmasters Club |
| CC | 4th Feb 2018 | Stephen R Vella | Noranda Toastmasters Club |
| Advanced Communicator Bronze | |||
| ACB | 22nd Feb 2018 | Sisca Octaviany | Electric Toasters |
| ACB | 19th Feb 2018 | Meethylesh Ramgobin | Electric Toasters |
| ACB | 15th Feb 2018 | Andre Joshua Mensink | Cannington Communicators |
| ACB | 7th Feb 2018 | Jeffrey Smith | Cannington Communicators |
| ACB | 4th Feb 2018 | Sophy Gotsis | Fremantle Gourmet Toastmasters Club |
| Competent Leadership | |||
| CL | 25th Feb 2018 | Ross Phillip Wilkinson | Persuasive Speakers |
| CL | 24th Feb 2018 | Almarie Meyer | Leading Lights Toastmasters |
| CL | 21st Feb 2018 | Blake William Sala Tenna | Kalamunda Toastmasters Club |
| CL | 26TH Feb 2018 | Agata Guzek | Curtin GSB Sundowner Toastmasters Club |
| CL | 20th Feb 2018 | Leon P. O'Brien | Fremantle Quaynote Speakers |
| Advanced Leadership Bronze | |||
| ALB | 27th Feb 2018 | Jonathon David Haylock | Bunbury Club |
| ALB | 8th Feb 2018 | Gladys Doreen Lavell | City of Cockburn Toastmasters |
| ALB | 7th Feb 2018 | Susan Dolgoy | St George's Toastmasters Club |
| ALB | 6th Feb 2018 | Phillip Pinto | Plain Speakers |
| High Performance Leadership | |||
| LDREXC | 16th Feb 2018 | Charles A. Fisher | Highgate Toastmasters Club |
Patricia D'Cruze, DTM
District 17 Program Quality Director
Pathways Update
by Patricia D'Cruze
Visit the District 17 Pathways Information page for resources for your Guest Pack. You will also find videos produced by our Pathways Guide Rey Lacson to help you get started in Pathways like how to disable the pesky pop up blocker.
Patricia D'Cruze, DTM
District 17 Program Quality Director
Club Membership Awards
by Cathy Kunzel
This time of the year is busy with training and Contests; however it is always important that we remember to keep on top of public relations and advertising our clubs to the wider public.
Some of you have been very busy with the PPP and getting those activities done that will bring guests and ultimately members into your club.
Toastmasters are very good at what they do, and they know that most clubs will lose 20% of members every year, which is why the Distinguished Club Program has two goals around membership, goal 7 – 4 new members and goal 8 – 4 more new members.
TALK UP TOASTMASTERS – 1st February to 31st March
There are still 12 days to achieve this award. Have you a special event coming up, “Talk up Toastmasters” is the chance to encourage your members to invite guests to this special meeting (contests are great for guest to see the fun side of Toastmasters). Prospective members can learn about Toastmasters many benefits, they add 5 new or reinstated members with a join date between February 1st and March 31 and you’ll receive a special “Talk up Toastmasters” ribbon to display on your club’s banner. Qualifying clubs can also earn a special discount code for 10% off their next club order.
BEAT THE CLOCK – 1 May to 30th June
Toastmasters are taught to run meetings on time, finish speeches on time and reach membership goals on time. In that spirit, "Beat the Clock" is a great motivator for finishing the year on schedule -on time and with record numbers! Make it your club’s goal to earn the "Beat the Clock" award and encourage every member to take part. Clubs adding five new, dual or reinstated members with a join date between May 1 and June 30 receive a "Beat the Clock" ribbon to display on the club’s banner. Qualifying clubs also earn a special discount code for 10-percent off their next club order.
For further terms and conditions please see toastmasters.org
Many clubs also wait until the end of the year to submit their educational awards, I encourage you to get your awards in and do all you can to help your clubs achieve Distinguished – 5/6 goals, Select Distinguished – 7/8 goals or President’s Distinguished – 9/10 club goals.
Thank you for those who have sent in PPP activities and I look forward to seeing your race to the finish over the next 3 months.
Cathy Kunzel, DTM
District 17 Public Relations Manager
It's More than a Gavel Club
by John Palmer
I was fortunate enough to officiate at the opening of a new Gavel Club in Lynwood as part of a much larger initiative, Leadership in Motion and Experience (LiME), the brain child of Toastmaster Ephraim Osaghae and founder of the LiME parent organisation Aus-Professional-Bridge. The official launch of LiME, occurred on February 15th at the Canning Town Hall. We had the Mayor of the City of Gosnells, the Deputy Mayor of the City of Canning and the State Member of Parliament for Cannington, Bill Johnston. During the launch of LiME, we demonstrated the Gavel Club component by having a year 9 Gavelier, Erin Peoples, of the Rossmoyne Gavel club present a 5-7-minute speech which was evaluated by a Year 10 member of Rossmoyne, Anna Bullard. It was a great success and the club was quickly established.
The focus of LiME is to facilitate high school children, to promote participation in the Australian cross-cultural contexts, gain communication and leadership skills, and provide mentorship for their vocational aspirations. During the first session of the LiME group several activities took place. We had speakers from several walks of life talk about opportunities available to the members. We also ran the introductory Gavel Club meeting where we covered some of the fundamentals of public speaking.
LiME sessions are held fortnightly on Saturday afternoons for about 3 hours, one hour of which is the Gavel Club, the other 2 hours are facilitated personal development streams and industry mentors assisting the members as well as a few fun and games to keep everyone happy. If you are interested in more information about the LiME initiative, check out the web site at http://aus-bridge.org.au/. It is well worth a visit!
John Palmer, DTM
Southern River Toastmasters
Handling Pathways Gaps
by Stephanie Chan
I have an overseas friend who has almost completed his DTM under Pathways. Through a Pathways program option, he has learnt to blog and constantly floods my message box with praises of new knowledge gained through Pathways. Commendable.
For us first timers and some technosaurs (technically uninclined), it has been a bit of a struggle to get started, notwithstanding the countless resources available online. Somehow in our neuro-pathways, there appears to be a disconnect between reading and doing. Still we plod on.
From a macro level, Pathways has indeed upped their ante on practical effectiveness in their streaming of the various Communication & Leadership Paths. While attempting the initial Level 1 projects, however, what our club members discovered was exclusion of the step-by-step speech focal points (structure, verbal and body language, voice etc.), detailed elaborations and objectives that we have benefitted from under the traditional Competent Communication (CC) Manual. My initial conclusions would then be that while Pathways is effective for intermediate and advanced Toastmasters, it is less so for brand new Toastmasters who have little or absolutely no clue as to what makes a good presentation.
While I do not deride the Pathways program, we also need to bridge that foundational gap for newbies and the “take-off and soar” path for those who have already tasted the fundamentals of contributors to an effective speech.
Southern River Toastmasters strongly feel that we need to arm our new members with a strong grounding before they can fully appreciate the benefits of Pathways.
In simplicity, our strategy is this:
- Design a Guide on how to enrol into Pathways and list the factors which make up an effective speech.
- This Guide will serve as a standard template for Mentors and Mentees to follow in their tutoring sessions.
- Balance stocks of CC Manuals will be provided to new Toastmasters to support their learning.
In Pathways, a new learning adventure awaits. With Pathways keenly focussed on observations (as stressed under their Evaluations process), this will also be our mantra in gauging how best to manage the program effectively and practically for both our brand new, intermediate and long standing members.
Stephanie Chan
Southern River Toastmasters Club, VP Public Relations
Newsletter Guidelines for Authors
- Articles must be relevant or of clear interest to Toastmaster members.
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- Preferred length 300-400 words, must not exceed 500 words
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Please e-mail articles to the Black Swan editor: jeremy.delpino@gmail.com
To ensure your article is published in the same month, please send it through by 6pm on the 12th.