Moree Toastmasters Club has had success at the Area 18 contest in Inverell on Saturday, with all three Moree competitors placing.
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Annette Hadley, Wendy Baldwin and Andrew O’Neill represented Moree in the Area 18 contest, facing off against participants from three other clubs – Narrabri, Inverell and Fossickers Way (Barraba, Bingara and Manilla).
Wendy had the most successful day, winning the Table Topics competition and placing second in the Humerous contest.
Meanwhile, Annette placed third in Table Topics and Andrew came third in the Humerous competition.
Moree Toastmasters vice president of public relations, Annette Hadley said it was a great achievement.
“We all came back with a place, so we were pretty chuffed with that,” she said.
“There were five competitors in each of the two competitions and they only award first, second and third in each.
“We’re not a very big club and so for our club to take out four of the six placings is pretty impressive, especially given we were competing against three others clubs.”
In the Humerous contest, Wendy’s ‘practically perfect’ prepared speech won the judges over, while Andrew’s speech on flat packs was also very entertaining.
Table topics is an impromptu public speaking contest where competitors are given a topic to speak on for one to two minutes.
The topic on Saturday was ‘surprise, surprise’.
“Wendy spoke about getting on the phone to Telstra and, ‘surprise, surprise’, having to wait,” Ms Hadley said.
“I spoke about how shocked my father was when I told him I’d joined a women’s AFL team, having never played organised sport in my life.”
The first two place getters for each competition get to progress to the division level.
As a result, Wendy will now go on to represent Area 18 at Division, held in Tamworth in September, for both the Humerous and Table Topics contests.
Andrew and Annette will only have the opportunity to compete in Tamworth if the first or second placed participant is unable to attend.
Moree Toastmasters Club currently has 15 members, but would love to reach 20.
They welcome new members and invite anyone interested to come along and see what it’s all about.
“It’s about a lot more than public speaking … it’s for anybody who wants to improve their confidence or skills,” Ms Hadley said.
“There’s leadership components as well. People can come along to improve their interview skills or be more confident going into a school or work presentation.”
The club meets every second and fourth Wednesday of the month at 6pm at Wesley Court. For more information, go to the Moree Toastmasters Facebook page or call Annette Hadley on 0429 675 233.
