Page 36 - June 2020
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FIELD NOTES






                                  How to Bring Over 500 People Together Under the Lockdown





                                                                                                          Brian Dodd, DTM
























      I had a dream back in 2008 that Toastmaster  approved Online Membership and attendance
      members could attend Toastmaster meetings  in regular club meetings, but not 100% Online

      online. The club I sponsored met in a fully  Clubs.  They had to wait until the next Board
      equipped conference room at Vancouver Island  Meeting in February 2016 where they approved
      Technology Park in Saanich.                            100% Online Clubs effective March 1st of that
          I was running for a District 21 Executive  year.
      position that year and mentioned about my                  Royal Roads Toastmasters Club approved

      dream. After the election, which I did not win,  acceptance of online members and guests in
      International Director Tevis T. Thompson, DTM,  2015. My other traditional club, First Canadian
      told me I gave the right speech in front of the  Toastmaster Club #38 “The Club that made

      wrong audience.                                        Toastmasters truly International,”  did so early
          I was not there back in 2012 when Ron  in 2016. Netizens and Firebirds became the first
      Clark and Manhal Shukayr held the first online  two chartered 100% Online clubs on March 1,
      meetings as a “Staff Study Group”. However, I  2016. I was the Chartered President of Firebirds.
      attended my first 100% online meeting in October           At the 2017 Toastmasters International

      2014 and joined the group, then named Netizens,   Convention in Vancouver, Canada, the Online
      and officially joined on January 1, 2015. In April,  Toastmasters contingent held four hybrid
      Netizens split into two clubs Firebirds Collective  20-minute Noon Meetings every day from

      and Netizens. I became a Firebird along with  just inside the Convention Center entrance.
      ten others. Firebirds Collective worked hard  I interviewed  Toastmasters’ members from
      and made a presentation to the outgoing Board  all corners of the world in those Noon Online
      of Directors that summer. Finally at the 2015  Meetings asking them what they thought of the
      Toastmaster International Convention, the Board  new paradigm of Toastmasters meeting online.





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