The Toastmasters official party line is that members should complete the CC that they are in the middle of. However, my club has a lot of members that go at a “leisurely” pace. It’s not realistic to tell someone:
- No – “You’ve only given a few speeches so you should just start Pathways and lose them”
- No – “You should invest even more time in the old program to complete your CC”
I’ve created a mapping of CC speeches to Pathways speeches. It actually maps decently. (Note: I don’t have access to Pathways Level 3 yet, so that mapping is speculation)
Here I list what I’d recommend you do with members who are early in their CC and slowly going in order. The full mapping table is at the end of this Pathways presentation. This is useful for people who complete their CC speeches out of order. Or to see specifically which projects to map.
</table.
| # speeches completed | Advice |
|---|---|
| 0 | Check if they have a CL to file in the next month or so. If not, start Pathways now! |
| 1 | Have the member enroll in Pathways now and mark the Icebreaker as complete. An evaluator may need to enter the evaluation on the new form, but the speech doesn’t change. |
| 2-3 | Have the member enroll in Pathways now. Mark the Icebreaker as complete. Read the Evaluation and Feedback project. One or two of the speeches required are already done so the member has a big head start on this project. An evaluator may need to enter the evaluation on the new form, but the speech doesn’t change. |
| 4 | See advice for 2-3 speeches completed. Keep the speech 4 evaluation in case it helps for level 3. But even if it doesn’t , “losing” credit for one speech is worth enrolling in Pathways straight away. |
| 5 | See advice for 4 speeches completed. Be sure to save the speech 5 evaluation for level 2 as it maps perfectly! |
| 6-8 | While some of these projects do map to Pathways, the member is over half done with the CC. So it makes sense to talk to the member about timing, benefits of getting a CC, intent to continue in Toastmasters, etc. |
| 9-10 | Almost done with the CC! Complete it before enrolling in Pathways! |