Find Out What Happens at That “Off the Cuff” Club!

Off the Cuff Toastmasters is having an Open House, our first one! Please join us on Saturday, Feb 23 at 6:00 pm for food and fun; the meeting proper will begin at 7:00 pm. The meeting location is 6203 Connie Lane, Colleyville, TX 76034. See our website for a map, phone numbers to call for information, and more about our club and our members.

We take Toastmasters seriously, but we also like to enjoy ourselves at our meetings. (That’s why we have a Fun Master as a meeting role!) We meet on the fourth Saturday of the month, share a potluck dinner, then have a meeting which includes three speeches, evaluations and Table Topics. We have a mix of experienced and less-experienced speakers. Here are the answers to some questions we are commonly asked:

Why is your club called “Off the Cuff?” 
That’s the kind of speeches we do! The toastmaster chooses a meeting theme, then creates broad-based topics that follow the theme. Because the topics are not narrow, the speakers generally have quite a bit of latitude in what they choose to talk about. Once the topics are given out, the speakers go to another room and have five minutes to outline their speech. It’s enough time to think up an opening, three points, and a conclusion.

Who needs an Ah-Counter when you have a cake like this?

Do you have prerequisites for membership?
No, we don’t. We do not call ourselves an advanced club. However, we are not the best club for beginning Toastmasters, mainly because we meet only once a month and do not have roles like Ah-Counter and Grammarian. Most of us feel that the first time through the CC manual should be done within the structure of a traditional club. But if we are a second club for you . . .

What manuals do you use?
Usually we do CC projects. Most of those will fit any speech. Occasionally someone does an advanced manual project from The Entertaining Speaker or Humorously Speaking. Specialty Speeches actually has a project on impromptu speaking. Our speeches are always manual speeches.

In your opinion, is giving an off-the-cuff speech a scary experience? Be truthful!
The first time you do it, yes it is, a little bit. After that, we’ve found it to be exhilarating.

If you think you would like to see what our club is all about, please give us a call or email. We hope you can  make it to our Open House, but if not, you are certainly welcome to come to any meeting!

Jodie Sanders VP Public Relations 682-233-2063 JodieSanders@d25toastmasters.org

Felicia Christian VP Membership 214-727-3478 FeliciaChristian@d25toastmasters.org