Tag Archives: pathways

completing toastmasters pathways level 2 before level 1 is approved

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See my main Presentation Mastery Pathways page for some context.

I completed all the projects in level 1 on January 4. My level 1 actually got approved today due to some difficulties in processing. I had lots of speaking opportunities in the club though and I successfully completed all the level 2 projects before I obtained access in Base Camp. This blog post is about that journey!

Each path has three required projects for level 2. All of them have the “Introduction to Toastmasters Mentoring” project. The Presentation Mastery path also has “Understanding your Communication Style” and “Effective Body Language.”

For level 2, you can do the three projects in any order. I describe them here in the order I did them.

Introduction to Toastmasters Mentoring

On January 10th, a speaker at our Speechcraft session cancelled so I jumped in with this speech. Since level 2 was locked, I went online to see if anyone had uploaded the PDF. I found out that a club shared the “Introduction to Toastmasters Mentoring” PDF online (link no longer works). The description on mentoring vs coaching was excellent. I like how the project has you speak about a time you were mentored.

For more on this project or how to download the evaluation sheet, see my starting level 2 blog post.

Effective Body Language

On January 16th, I was giving members of my New York club an unofficial preview of Pathways. I choose to use the “Effective Body Language” speech for this. I couldn’t find the PDF manual online. Instead I went to the “Speeches and Evaluations” section of Base Camp and downloaded the evaluation sheet. I gave my speech and got evaluated.

Now (as I write this blog post), I’m reading the actual project. I learned that I was supposed to get feedback from a mentor or reviewer while practicing. Oops. The online project also contains good tips on posture, stance, position and movement. I need to move more deliberately when I speak! There was also good descriptions of the four different types of gestures: descriptive, emphatic, suggestive and prompting. There was a video and great interactive exercises. Finally, there were references to culture and the visual impaired.

Understanding your Communication Style

One of my clubs meets on Thursdays lunchtime. At the January 18th meeting, we had a speaker cancel the evening before. This happens sometimes. Work is of course the priority! As a DTM, I knew it would be no trouble to put together a speech the night before. And it was a perfect opportunity to complete level 2!

The same club that shared the “Introduction to Toastmasters Mentoring” also club shared the “Understanding your Communication Style” PDF online.

I read the PDF. It contains an excellent 12 question “test” where you answer how you view yourself. Then you add up the scores to determine your communication style:

  • Analytical
  • Direct
  • Initiating
  • Supporting

You can then read how each communication style interacts with the others. (The online version is better because it automatically tallies your score and lets you control the order in which you read about the styles.)

Not surprisingly, I’m mainly analytical/direct. Then I had to write a speech. Since Pathways is new, I chose to include a couple sentences on what each was. Then I had the audience vote on which they thought was my predominant style. The majority of my speech was me telling a story of a strength (or perceived weakness) of my interactions with each of the four styles. It wound up being a great speech. Our VPE even suggested that I save it for the humorous speech contest.

This is a great project and really shows the benefit of the Pathways educational program!

Submitting level 2

Since I did all three projects on paper, I went back and clicked through in Base Camp. Then I emailed my evaluations to our club leadership for approval. And now they know what to do so getting access to Level 3 should be fast!

 

Approving a Pathways level request

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I submitted my Pathways Level 1 award in early January. Due to a combination of club officer vacations and the officers not knowing what to do (since Pathways is new), it took over a month to get it approved. I completed level 2 in that time.

Today, I screenshared with the club President and we approved my Level 1 award. Now that we know what to do,we know it should take under ten minutes. Here’s the process to quickly and easily approve a level for members of your Toastmasters club!

Step 1 – the club officer gathers info that the member  has completed the projects in the path.

There are a few options for doing this

  1. The member provides sufficient evidence that he/she has completed the speeches in the path. I went this route and emailed all my evaluations to the President and VPE. (I had chose this option because I’m a member of two clubs so the officers of the Pathways club have no other ways of validating)
  2. Past meeting agendas
  3. Speak easy or other online tracking system.

I recommend having the member at least provide you with the dates for validation if not the evaluations.

Step 2 – sign in to base camp manager

The club President, VPE or Secretary has to do this step.

  1. Sign into toastmasters.org
  2. Click “pathways”
  3. Click “go to basecamp”
  4. In the middle tile, you’ll have two options – you could choose “log in as a member” – but don’t. That takes you to Base Camp rather than Base Camp Manager. Instead, click the button under it to go to Base Camp Manager.
  5. Click “Pending Requests”
  6. Clcik the members name to view the transcript to verify. This could be cross referencing PDF evals or looking at agendas
  7. Then click the green checkbox to approve or the red x to reject. Either way, you can leave an optional comment to submit.

This process (starting from step 5), is described in the official docs with screenshots.

The member gets an email. I got mine a few minutes after the club officer hit approve.

Step 3 – getting DCP credit

Then go back into toastmasters.org and file an educational award. This increases the member’s title and gets credit towards the club’s DCP. It’s easy though – no need to type in titles:

  1. Club central
  2. Submit education awards
  3. Select member from pull down
  4. Education – level 1 (or whatever level)
  5. Submit

what to do with toastmasters members in the middle of their CC when pathways launches

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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:

  1. No – “You’ve only given a few speeches so you should just start Pathways and lose them”
  2. 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!