
Last night was an big night for us at our Laurel Highlands Toastmasters meeting. We were going to be nominating new officers for the 2025-26 Toastmasters year. Our President, Sharon, will be representing the District beginning July 1 as our Program Quality Director and I look forward to seeing what she has planned. Weβre already looking ahead to Fall as well, more to come at a later date. Ryan will serve as President and he could very well be tasked with the goal of leading our club to Smedley Distinguished. That’s one of the new designations coming into the new Toastmasters year. It will require the 10 goals that would get the club to President’s Distinguished but a minimum of 25 members. We will get there at Laurel Highlands next year.
For the first time in my Toastmasters journey, I will be serving as Treasurer. I have plenty of people to answer my questions if I need to know what to do to properly carry out my duties next year. Our club Treasurer at Greensburg will become President of that club next year.
We had a nice speaker mix last night with an ice breaker and two mentoring speeches. Four guests attended as well, with two online and two in-house all excited to learn more about Toastmasters. Our President got us fired up for the meeting and stressed the importance of attending the meeting on this night. Out of our 14 members, we had enough in attendance for a quorum. The election of new officers did not take long at all, and it was a very smooth process.
Looking ahead, we have Summer Club Officer Training on June 21 at Westmoreland County Community College in Youngwood, but members will have the choice of attending online as well. Thus it is a hybrid (in person or online) event. Our last meeting of the year will be at Bud Murphy’s on June 24. I’m hoping we will celebrate as a President’s Distinguished Club.
Next Friday there is a demo meeting at the Panera Bread in Morgantown which is putting together by our Area 3 Director/Club Growth Director-Elect , along with one of our members at Laurel Highlands. This club will bring Toastmasters back into northern WV, if it charters. It will also benefit West Virginia University and the surrounding community. If I’m off, I’ll consider taking a drive down to Morgantown to attend this event. What’s needed to get this club off the ground: 20 members and so far a good number of people make up part of that magic number. Some volunteers are still needed. I’ll be reaching out to Greensburg via email tomorrow and get the word out about this event.
We are a great club representing many nations, achievements, and interests at Laurel Highlands. We will make history this year when we get to President’s Distinguished, and next year when we get to Smedley Distinguished!