Advantages of Advanced Toastmastering By Peter M. Gordon, DTM

Are you an experienced Toastmaster looking for opportunities to improve your speaking skills?  Perhaps you’d like more detailed evaluations to help identify your strengths and weaknesses?  If so, you might want to visit an Advanced Toastmaster Club.

Last year I joined with a group of Toastmasters in the Orlando area to found Orlando Advanced Toastmasters (OATS – 2781741).  Our members’ educational achievements ranged from CC to DTM, but all of us had one thing in common – we wanted to get better, faster. From the first meeting we felt we were getting great results while still having a great time at the meetings. How good were our results? One of our founding members, Monty Ray Davidson, made it to the finals of the International Speech Contest.  Monty said, “a key part of my success was the quality of the evaluations and support I received from OATS members.”

Every manual speech by OATS members is evaluated by at least three people, using the tried and true Toastmasters “what I heard, what I saw, what I felt” criteria. After the formal evaluations, other members provide comments, and the speaker can ask specific questions about any point in the speech. Manual evaluations provide credit for every speech. We also evaluate Table Topics, to sharpen our impromptu speaking skills.

OATS meets two Saturdays each month for two and a half hours.  The longer meetings enable us to schedule four to six speakers, depending upon the length of speech, and still have room for evaluations and table topics. Our members are busy, so two meeting dates increases the opportunity that members can attend at least one meeting. The length of our meetings enables us to accommodate members who want to give longer speeches from the professional speaker’s manual and/or offer workshops. Last November I took advantage of our longer meeting to present a one hour presentation I created for a job interview. The feedback I received enabled me to make a strong impression on the interviewing panel.

Since our goal is to enhance everyone’s Toastmasters experience, we require members keep their home club membership, which means every OATS member is in at least two clubs. Members and officers from our members’ home clubs have repeatedly said OATS members provide a great example for both new and experienced members, and are sought-after mentors.

I’m talking about OATS because it’s my advanced club. Before we launched, our first President and first VP Education, April Holtzman and Jack Dillon, visited other advanced clubs around the state to find the best mix of practices that worked for us.

If you can’t join OATS, there may be another advanced club near you. Why don’t you check it out?  If there isn’t an advanced club in your area, District 84 can help you start one.

Don’t wait another minute to sample the advantages an advanced Toastmasters club can give you.