Thursday, November 20, 2008

December Meetings and Holiday Party

Good morning Top O' The Rock Toastmasters,
 
We had an excellent turnout yesterday at our meeting, and I wanted to thank everyone for attempting to make it. Let's keep it up.
 
The minutes from yesterday's meeting are available on the blog at www.toporock.org, please be sure to check out what took place.
 
There are very important dates that you need to note:

1. We will not have a meeting next Wednesday 11/26, in observance of the Thanksgiving Holiday.

2. We also will not be meeting December 24 and 31 in observance of the holiday season.

3. Officers, we will be meeting after our meeting on December 3rd, in attempts to see where we stand at the end of 2008. If you can not make it please provide Jose or myself with your report on where you stand with your responsibilities and what you are working on. We will take the information you provide and represent you at the meeting.

4. We will be having a holiday party as part of our meeting on December 10th. We will have our regular meeting, and at the same time eating some great food in a small holiday party. Our meeting for that day will take place at Prudential. As we get closer to the date I will send a reminder and additional information. To make the meeting enjoyable for all I need some help. Jeanne is going to assist me in getting the sandwiches, but I need help from people in attaining the following items:
- drinks
- paper products (plates, eating utensils, napkins and cups)
- chips and dip
- cookies
- veggie plate
 
If you can provide any of these items please let me know by responding to our Secretary. Thank you in advance for your help.
 
I hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving Holiday and we will see everyone on December 3rd.
 
Andrea Siracusa
Secretary
Top O' The Rock Toastmasters
625-1405

11-19-2008 - Meeting Minutes

Good morning fellow Top O’ The Rock Toastmasters,


We had a productive meeting on November 19.


First we voted in our newest member Flor Lepervanche. Welcome Flor!


We opened our meeting with an invocation provided by Jose Lepervanche. Flor Lepervanche provided the word of the day – kinetic; kinetic means relating to motion; energy.


We had two speakers, Andrea Siracusa and Jeanne Hammond. Andrea presented her 10th and final speech in the Competent Communication Manual. Her speech entitled Dedication…Says It All focused on a fictional setting in which Andrea worked to inspire employees to work hard in 2009. Sue Stack was the evaluator for Andrea’s speech. Jeanne presented her fourth speech in the Competent Communication Manual, entitled Long Ago and Far Away. Jeannne took us into her experience in living in Hyde Park in Chicago. Wanda Brown was her evaluator.


Congratulations to Andrea who was voted Best Speaker and Sue Stack who took the honor of Best Evaluator.


Jose Lepervanche organized our Table Topics which focused on acting out emotions. Individuals had to act out the emotion that they chose unknowingly from a pile created by Jose. The person that was to speak next, had to guess what emotion the previous person was acting out. The emotions that were acted upon included anger, happiness, friendship, joy and stress. Congratulations to Jacqueline Rudloff who was voted as the best Table Topic Speaker.


Thank you to Catalina Agustin who was our um/ah counter, Jacqueline Rudloff our time keeper and Juan Carlos Perez our Vote Counter.


Reminder: We will NOT be meeting on November 26, December 24 and December 25, all in observance of the holidays. Enjoy the break! We WILL STILL MEET on December 3rd and 10th. On the 10th we will meet at Prudential and celebrating our Holiday Party.


Club Officers: We would like to meet December 3rd after our meeting, to discuss possible considerations for the end of 2008 and the beginning of 2009. So please be sure to note that we want to meet for about 20-30 minutes after the meeting. If you can not attend please send Jose or Andrea your officer update so your information can be distributed during the meeting.


Thank you

Andrea Siracusa

Secretary

Top O’ The Rock

ajsiracusa@yahoo.com

Monday, November 17, 2008

2008 Nov - District 84 Fall Conference

Aloha! We attended the first ever District 84 Fall Conference in Melbourne, Florida



It was a great experience to be there competing in the Speech Evaluation Contest. We had a lot of fun. Our Division A was represented by members from different clubs.


Sunday, November 9, 2008

Wed. 11.05.08 Toastmaster Meeting Summary

Wed. 11.05.08 Toastmaster Meeting Summary

Good morning fellow Top O’ The Rock Toastmasters,

We had a productive meeting yesterday.

We opened our meeting with an invocation provided by Wanda Brown. Catalina Agustin provided the word of the day – plethora. Plethora means fullness or to be full.

Jemerson Diaz was our only speaker for the day. His speech entitled “Fascinating Concept,” guided us into the different styles of communications between men and women. Warren Heinrich was Jemerson’s evaluator, and provided great feedback regarding his speech.

Wanda organized our Table Topics today which took an interesting change of pace. Our table topics session consisted of all members creating a story using the one word they were provided. With the start of Warren, we each continued the story, making sure we used our words chosen for us, which included: private schools, secret services, air force one, Michelle, two little girls, White House, united and Jessie Jackson; as you can tell our theme for today’s topics centered on politics. Congratulations to Warren who was voted as the best table topics speaker.

Thank you to Juan Carlos who was our um/ah counter, Sue Stack our time keeper and Jacqueline Rudloff our Vote Counter.

Reminder: In the efforts to make all our meetings successful and to allow all members the opportunity to reach their communications and leadership goals, please remember that we need all members to sign up for roles each week. Having roles already assigned before the meeting allows the meeting to follow in a very stable manner, providing the best atmosphere for members and guests. Please take the time to send the roles you would like to participate in to Tom Snead (tom.snead@prudential.com) our VP of Education.

Club Officers: We would like to meet next Wednesday after our meeting to discuss possible considerations for the end of 2008 and the beginning of 2009. So please be sure to note that we want to meet for about 10-20 minutes after the meeting.


Thank you
Andrea Siracusa
Secretary
Top O’ The Rock
ajsiracusa@yahoo.com

Wednesday, October 22, 2008

10.15.08 Top O' The Rock Toastmaster Meeting Summary

Fellow Top O’ The Rock Toastmasters, Wednesday we had a great meeting.

We had two guests – Darby Stubberfield ( a guest of Andrea’s; and Director of Development for Boys & Girls Clubs) and Tyler Rounds (a student at the University of North Florida – Communications Department). Thank you both for joining us, we hope to see you at future meetings.

We started off our meeting with Jemerson Diaz providing the invocation.

Catalina Agustin provided the word of the day – sobriquet. The word means nickname or assumed name.

Yesterday we had a great ice breaker speech by Connie Rhodebeck. Her speech titled “Raised By Boys” was a great look into her life and family. Jose Lepervanche was her evaluator.

John Lee provided a very entertaining speech about Jose Lepervanche. His speech was from one of the advanced communications manual and focused on “the roast.” John’s speech was entitled “A Man of Many Hats.” Wanda Brown was his evaluator.

Congratulations to Connie Rhodebeck for being the best speaker and Jose Lepervanche for being the best evaluator.

Tom Snead organized our table topics. The topics included the strangest topics every asked: What do you think about Las Vegas; if I was a tree; have you ever wondered; and the strangest things you have counted. Steve Nguyen, Jemerson Diaz, Jeanne Hammond and myself had a chance to participate, with Jemerson Diaz being voted the Best Table Topic Speaker.

Also thank you to Sue Stack who was our Toastmaster; Jemerson Diaz who was our vote counter; Steve Nguyen our um/ah counter and Jeanne Hammond our timekeeper. I was honored to serve as the Master Evaluator.

I look forward to seeing everyone next week.

Thank you

Andrea Siracusa

Secretary

Top O’ The Rock

ajsiracusa@yahoo.com

McCain / Obama Roast Oct 2008

What John McCain, Barack Obama and Jose Lepervanche have in common?

They were roasted in the same week !!!

The Roast is one of the speeches of one of the Toastmasters International's Advanced Manual.
Enjoy two funny roasts delivered by the two presidential candidates and pay attention to their techniques, punch lines, pauses, etc.

McCain




Obama

First Place Speech Evaluation Contest


Thank you Connie for supporting our club members


All the participants in the Humorous Speech and Speech Evaluation Division A Contest



Congratulations to our very own member/president Jose Lepervanche who took FIRST PLACE this weekend in Division A Speech Evaluation Contest.

After competing in the Club, Area, and Division level, Jose will now move on to the District 84 Fall Conference scheduled for November 7-9. In Melbourne, Florida. This is a great time for Jose and our Club. Please join us as we cheer him on. You can register for the conference at www.toastmastersD84.org.

The First and Second place in the Humorous Speech Contest also belong to Area 12.

The Top O’ The Rock Toastmasters Club is one of the oldest and strong clubs in Jacksonville. Our meetings are at San Marco Library, 1513 Lasalle St. (904) 858-2907 every Wednesday from 12 noon to 1 pm. Guests are welcome. Toastmasters International (www.toastmasters.org) is a non-profit organization which gives its members the opportunity to develop and improve their public speaking abilities through local club meetings, training seminars and speech contests. Toastmasters International includes more than 199,000 men and women in more than 9,300 clubs in more than 70 countries.

Top O' The Rock Toastmasters
Club # 2155 - Jacksonville, Florida