Philadelphia’s First Member Pat Paulus Shares Her Experiences At Toastmaster’s District 38 Fall Conference

by Pat Paulus

Some of my favorite and most rewarding Toastmaster experiences are the District 38 Fall and Spring conferences and the International Conference.  What makes these events so awesome is that the best Toastmasters has to offer rises to higher levels at these events.

These conferences provide opportunities to establish new relationships, find mentors, expand existing relationships, share experiences, brainstorm with like-minded Toastmasters, learn from the esteemed speakers, and most importantly – bring these new, exciting, creative ideas back to our club for everyone’s benefit.

One of the most exciting features in recent District 38 conferences is the extremely high caliber of speakers gathered.  Extremely esteemed Toastmasters from outside our district have attended and presented some of their best material. This conference was no exception.

For those of you who have heard our District’s very own Past International President Dilip Abayasakara speak, it is hard to imagine anyone better. Dilip competed twice in the International Speech contest and twice finished second. The second time he competed, he lost to Dana LaMon, who traveled all the way from Lancaster, California to share an unforgettable lesson on how and why he won.

Also very memorable and valuable was our very own past District Governor and current Division D Governor, Robert Cranston who spoke about getting the most out of your connections.

One of our District webmasters, Jim Marshall, gave for many clubs, a much needed demonstration lecture on setting up and maintaining a club website for free using Toastmasters’ cookie cutter website software.  We are extremely fortunate to have John Boxmeyer, who maintains our club website, which is so much nicer than the free Toastmaster software.  Jim even stated that if someone in your club can maintain a more sophisticated website, use that person. We are blessed that John does this for us.

Of course, other highlights were the contests. Deb Flage won the Table Topics contest. Peter Boone won second place. The Table Topic question was “The district theme is ‘Pay It Forward. How do you individually ‘Pay It Forward’? In the Humorous contest, Charles Wilson was first, George Philip finished second. All of the speeches were very funny and entertaining.

Fun Night Friday night also had highlights. The food was excellent. We watched professional ballroom dancers dance to different tunes, picked up some dance steps, and then danced ourselves. During our main Friday night events, Loretta Casalaina entertained and educated us on different ways to deliver humor. This was followed by some of our funniest Toastmasters delivering very famous comedy skits. We also networked, shared experiences, and most importantly, had fun.

This conference was a little different for me as I was the only Toastmaster from our club. We usually have several club members in attendance. Let’s reestablish that at the Spring Conference Friday 4/30 and Saturday 5/1/2010 in Harrisburg. For more details, ask me.