Message from Area 83 Director

This year I had the honour to serve Toastmasters as Area Director, D-83. This means I am tasked with being the liaison between 4 clubs in the South East Oakville and the District 86. This entails ensuring clubs are informed of changes and new programs from the District but most importantly supporting the clubs so club members get the most of their time invested in Toastmasters. Clubs in Area D83 are: Glen Abbey Toastmasters, Horizon Toastmasters, Sheridan Trafalgar Toastmasters, and Own the Moment Oakville Toastmasters. This year, of course, was especially challenging with the global pandemic keeping people indoors. All clubs embraced online meetings and members are as engaged as ever!

 Horizon Toastmasters is a very traditional club that follows a traditional agenda. Club members are a pleasant mix of experienced and new Toastmasters making each meeting interesting. By having an engaging meeting and really mixing up the agenda, Toastmasters made it through individual targets. Collectively, they achieved the highest awards for club education goals:

President’s Distinguished Club              Gold Online Ovation Education Award.

Glen Abbey Toastmasters are consistent high achievers. They bring fun to traditional with a young executive team and meetings that are professional, punctual, and powerful. Glen Abbey’s meetings are so captivating, they have the highest guest conversion in the Area at one point having to close memberships to maintain the opportunities available to current members! The drive of Club President, Krista Rowan to deliver productive meetings every week is converted into the staggering accomplishments of the club:

President’s Distinguished Club             Gold Online Ovation Education Award                                                 Membership Resiliency Award

Sheridan Trafalgar Toastmasters is a college club at the Sheridan Trafalgar campus. The membership base consists of students and alumni. The nature of this club attracts many new members but it is hard to get consistent commitment. Sheridan brings a youthful and artistic feel with a fresh website, engaging takes on Pathway speeches, and a base with growth mindsets. Through their shear determination and some guidance from club coaches, Sheridan was able to achieve:

Distinguished Award                               Membership Resiliency Award                                                                  Silver Online Ovation Education Award

Own the Moment Oakville Toastmasters is the newest club in the Area and is always on trend. They quickly embraced online meetings without skipping a meeting. Own the Moment recognized the gap in the Toastmaster year with the removal of the Fall Conference and speech contests and hosted the first “Happy Oakville Interclub Summit for Toastmasters” featuring a TableTopics like no other. As always, Own the Moment celebrates members in style regularly hosting Open Houses that are the talk of Oakville. The next open house is a Zoom Open House with special guests Tom Adams Peng, Oakville Ward 6 Councillor and Regional Councillor in attendance. Accomplishments for the year are:

President’s Distinguished Club                   Gold Online Ovation Education Award

Area D83

The collective efforts have resulted in the following Area awards:

Select Distinguished Area                               Gold Online Ovation Award (Area)                                                    Visiting Victor Award

It has been so rewarding to have met the people in the clubs in Area D83. Congratulations to every single Toastmaster of Area D83.

Sasha-Li Chinloy, ACG ALB (soon to be DTM!),  6 Jun 2020