At the AGM on 16th May 2013 Niki Boersma was elected President for the a second year, and possibly for the first time ever, every club officer was re-elected for the 2013/14 season.
This is the full committee:
| President | Niki Boersma |
| Publicity Officer & Vice President | Jocelyn Brooks |
| Education Director & Imm Past President | Howard Herbert |
| Secretary | Peter Wilson |
| Treasurer | Neil Wilson |
| Social Secretary | Mavis Cryer |
| Webmaster | Chris Clissitt |
Chris Clissitt with the National Speech trophy and the Wetherby SC banner, which was on display all weekend at the conference
Chris Clissitt came first in the National Speech Contest at Castle Donington on Saturday 27th April. There were 8 competitors representing the 8 districts which make up in the National Association, and Chris won with his speech entitled “The Problem With Solutionism.”
This was Wetherby’s 3rd different winner of the trophy following Roy Bowen in 1980 and Terry Ryan in 2009. In fact, Wetherby have provided two winners and two runners up in the last 8 years alone (Terry was runner up in 2011.) Not bad for a small club!
And it doesn’t end there….. Neil Wilson represented the club in the National Evaluation contest on Sunday morning and delivered an excellent evaluation. Whilst not in the places on this occasion, he acquitted himself well and enjoyed the experience.
Neil Wilson, who competed in the National Evaluation contest
And for Eastern District more good news – Lindsay Dutch of York RISC was installed as National President. We wish him all the best for a very successful year of office.
Mention must also go to Martin Bishop of Bradford SC who was appointed Eastern District President.
Thanks to Jocelyn Brooks, our Publicity Officer, who took the opportunity to display the Wetherby Speakers Club banner in a prominent location for the whole weekend, generating a healthy amount of interest from passers by.
The National Conference of the Association of Speakers Clubs was held at Castle Donington on April 26th, 27th and 29th. In addition to the AGM the finals of the Topics, Speech and Evaluation contests took place. The Wetherby Club had two contestants taking part.
Chris Clissitt of Knaresborough, and a member of Wetherby Speakers Club, won the Speech Contest with a brilliant speech entitled The Problem with Solutionism and was presented with the trophy. This was the third time in the history of the competition that the trophy has been won by a member of the Wetherby Club and the audience was appreciative and delighted at Chris’s success.
Neil Wilson took part in the Evaluation contest at the same Conference. His was an excellent evaluation and, although he didn’t win on this occasion, he was presented with a certificate to acknowledge that he was one of the eight top speech evaluators in the country. Jocelyn Brooks also gained a certificate of achievement for having completed the speaking assignments in the club manual.
All together it was a very successful Conference for the Wetherby Club