Glen Abbey Toastmasters held the 2024 Evaluation and International Speech Contests on November 27, 2024. With a full house of members and guests, the contest was a great night of listening to evaluations and speeches. Contest Chair Zakaria Sekhri led the evenings two contests.
International Speech Contest
We had three contestants for our International Speech Contest, and we heard amazing speeches about Why Not Me, Time Travel, and Mistaken identities. First and second place winners will compete in the Area Cotnests in January 2025.
International speeches are original speeches of 5-7 minutes. They can be given on any subject, and can be serious, funny, or inspirational. The International Speech Contest is held at the Club, Area, Division, District, and International level, and as it goes all the way to the International level,
Congratulations Kathy Bullock 1st Place – 2024 International Speech Contest
Congratulations Krista Rowan 2nd Place – 2024 International Speech Contest
Evaluation Contest
Thanks to our Test Speaker for the Evaluation Contest – Doug Flowers from Horizon Toastmasters. First and second place winners will compete in the Area Cotnests in January 2025.
Evaluations are 2 to 3 minutes in length. All of the evaluation contestants must evaluate the same speech, so a test speaker from outside the club is brought in to present one speech to the entire group. The contestants are then taken from the room and given five minutes to prepare their evaluations. Then they come back into the room, and one by one, deliver their evaluations. The Evaluation Contest is held at the Club, Area, Division, and District level.
Congratulations Pramela Nair Panthallor 1st Place – 2024 Evaluation Contest
Congratulations Niti Goel 2nd Place – 2024 Evaluation Contest
We are excited to announce that Glen Abbey Toastmaster’s very own Lori O’Grady took first place during the Mary Heary Tall Tales Contest held at the Oakville Toastmasters Club. She had the audience captivated and laughing along as she delivered her speech titled “Amen”. Congratulations Lori!
Feast your eyes (above) on our absolutely stunning Glen Abbey Champions: Area 83 Table Topics 2022 Champions are Roger Cogle and Wajiha Sabrani!
Area Table Topics Contest: Facts
There were 5 contestants, from 3 different clubs.
Speakers were given the same topic prompt – the word FREEDOM, and only a few seconds to prep before speaking about it.
Each speaker gave their interpretation on what FREEDOM means to them
GATM’s club-level Table Topics contest in Dec 2021 was the first time either Roger or Wajiha had competed!
Roger joined the club a little over a year ago, while Wajiha joined just 3 months ago in Fall 2021.
Roger will go on to compete at the Division contest in February, but if he cannot attend, Wajiha will compete in his place.
Feast your eyes (above) on our absolutely stunning Glen Abbey Champions: Area 83 International Speech 2022 Champions are Zehra Raza and Krista Rowan!
Area International Speech Contest: Facts
There were 6 contestants from 3 different clubs
Each speaker had 5-7 minutes to deliver a speech they had prepared in advance
While the speeches were all different, they had common themes – making a difference in people’s lives, being inspirational, and leaving a lasting legacy
This is the SECOND year in a row that Zehra and Krista were the 1st and 2nd place winners in the Area-level contest
In 2021, Zehra won the Division-level contest and went to compete at the District-level (just one level before reaching the World Championship)
Zehra will go on to compete at the Division contest in February, but if she cannot attend, Krista will compete in her place
Zehra has been a member since 2017 and Krista has been a member since 2018
Glen Abbey Toastmasters will be hosting the Club level Table Topics and International Speech Contests in December 2021
Table Topics Speech Contest
Table Topics are 1-2 minutes long. They are impromptu speeches given on a topic that the speaker has no prior knowledge of. The contest is held at the Club, Area, Division, and District level.
The Table Topics Contest will be held on December 1, 2021
International Speech Contest
International speeches should be original speeches of 5-7 minutes. They can be given on any subject, and can be serious, funny, or inspirational. The International Speech Contest is held at the Club, Area, Division, District, and International level, and as it goes all the way to the International level, it is the most important of all the Toastmaster contests, and where the World Champion of Public Speaking is decided! In order to be a contestant in this contest, a Toastmaster must have completed at least 6 speeches from the Competent Communicator or Pathways Program.
The International Speech Contest will be held on December 15, 2021
We’re looking forward to seeing and hearing Glen Abbey Toastmasters compete!
Winners At The 2021 Area 83 International Speech Contest
We’re thrilled for two Glen Abbey Toastmasters: Zehra Reza and Krista Rowan. They placed first and second in the Area 83 International Speech contest which was held online on February 26, 2021.
This means that they will both move up to compete with contestants from other areas in the Division D contest on Feb 20th 2021. Congratulations to both of them from the GATM family!
About the International Speech Contest
International speeches should be original speeches of 5-7 minutes. They can be given on any subject, and can be serious, funny, or inspirational. The International Speech Contest is held at the Club, Area, Division, District, and International level, and as it goes all the way to the International level, it is the most important of all the Toastmaster contests, and where the World Champion of Public Speaking is decided! In order to be a contestant in this contest, a Toastmaster must have completed at least 6 speeches from the Competent Communicator or Pathways Program.
On April 24th, the club organised the Mary Heary Tall Tales Contest. It was a great chance for participants to use creative ways to add some fun and exaggerations to their stories. We had three contestants and one winner!
Participants: – Krista Rowan – Gordon Vuong – Bahareh Tehrani
And the winner was: Krista Rowan
Krista will be competing against the best tall tale-tellers from Toastmasters clubs in the Oakville area. Congratulations Krista!
Glen Abbey will be hosting it’s Club Humorous Speech Contest on November 21st, 2018.
What is A Humorous Speech?
Humorous Speeches are 5 to 7 minutes long. They should be thematic in nature (having an opening, body, and close), contain original content, use clean humour, and not be a series of one liners. Vocal variety, gestures, and speech content all play a part in a successful humorous speech. They should be substantially original. Any quoted material must be identified during the presentation.
Area 83 International Speech Contest & Evaluation Contest 2018 was held on February 21, 2018, and was hosted by our very own Glen Abbey Toastmasters Club. We are excited to announce that our members did very well in the contest. Congratulations Mikael Gatje who placed second in both the Evaluation and International contests, and Zehra Raza who placed third in the Evaluation contest. The Chair for the Evaluation was Sean Connor, who did a great job at running the contest and bringing energy to the evening.
International Speech Contest & Evaluation Contest 2019 was held on January 16th, 2019 at Glen Abbey Toastmasters Club. The Winners of the first and second places will represent our Club at the Area 83 International Speech contest and Evaluation contests.
On Thursday February 7th, members of the Glen Abbey Toastmasters club competed in the Area 83 Evaluation and International Speech Contest. The competitors were selected from 4 Toastmasters clubs in the Oakville area: Horizon, Sheridan Bruins of Oakville, Own the Moment, and of course our very own Glen Abbey Toastmasters!
Zehra Raza and Richard Kitney represented Glen Abbey in the Evaluation Contest. Yas Sakka and Zehra Raza represented us in the International Speech Contest.
Zehra was selected as the winner of the Evaluation contest and was second place finalist in the Evaluation Contest. Zehra will go on to compete in the Evaluation Contest on March 19, 2019.
Congratulations to all the Area 83 Speech and Evaluation Contest Competitors and Winners!
We cheered for Glen Abbey Toastmasters Humorous and Table Topics Club Contest winners, Zehra Raza and Srini Kesavan, as they represented our club at the Area 83 contest. After an exciting round of speeches, we are proud to announce that Zehra Raza was a 1st Place Winner in the Area Table Topics Contest and will be moving on to the Division level on October 18, 2017.
Congratulations to the winners of the recent Mary Heary Tall Tales Contest – (left to right) Keith Rabey – 3rd place; Srini Kesavan – 1st place; Richard Kitney – 2nd place.
And To All Our Competitors – It Takes Courage To Compete! – (left to right) Keith Rabey, Richard Kitney, Zehra Raza, Srini Kesavan, & Chris Roode
Congratulations Tony and Srini. You made Glen Abbey Toastmasters very proud by taking first and second place in the Area 35 Speech Contests. Good luck at District finals!
2016 Area 35 Contest Winners – Evaluation Contest: Reema Duggal (1st place) and International Speech Contest: Tony Corrie (1st place)
2016 Glen Abbey Toastmasters Club International Speech Contest Winners Srini Kesavan (3rd place), Tony Corrie (1st place), and Frederique Herel (2nd place)
2016 Glen Abbey Toastmasters Club Evaluation Contest Winners Sean Connor (2nd place) and Reema Duggal (1st place)
2016 Glen Abbey Toastmasters Club International Speech Contest Participants Srini Kesavan, Kevin Chisholm (Chair), Chris Roode, Tony Corrie, Jack Jagernauth (Chief Judge), Frederique Herel, Mike Kozak, and Wendy Rintoul
2016 Glen Abbey Toastmasters Club Evaluation Contest Participants Jack Jagernauth (Chief Judge), Nicole Wong (Chair), Sean Connor, Reema Duggal, Danny Zhang, and Mike Kozak
Five brave contestants battled it out at the annual Mary Heary Tall Tales Competition on Wednesday May 13, 2015. They regaled us with fantastic tales that had two things in common – ridiculous stories and lots of laughter.
Congratulations to our winner Tony Corrie who will be representing the Club at the Area contest on May 28. Thank you also to our wonderful co-Chairs Norkys Crespo and Roberto Fazio who did a great job of directing proceedings smoothly and with flair!