by Patty Wyatt VPPR Keller Communicators
What do you share with 200 high school students? You give them something essential, yet dynamic – you show them how to ‘Own the Room’.
Recently, District 25 was invited to present a soft-skills workshop at the Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA) Area 7 Conference at Central High School in Keller. FBLA is the world’s largest business career and technical student organization aimed at academic competitions and leadership development. At the Area 7 Conference, students took part in 40 different events such as digital animation and entrepreneurship.
I collaborated with FBLA Area 7 President and Central High School Junior Akanksha Jha to provide a 45-minute workshop and an man an expo booth.
Sharing the stage with me were Najaf Dostaliyev, Karen Coleman, and Jon Lukacher and assistants Liz Brenner, Hari Nair, and Tammy Kasterke. Mark Novak served as the event photographer. We conducted an interactive workshop with two mini-sessions, focusing on building confidence:
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- Karen Coleman presented, “What’s Your Pitch?” illustrating how students can use 30 seconds to articulate their goal, their unique qualities, and their call-to-action. Three students were invited to the stage to rehearse their brand pitch.
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- Jon Lukacher helped students combine their pitch with interview best practices. He offered tips on how to approach the most common interview questions and demonstrated what-not-to-do with the help of a volunteer.
Our booth interactions were very intentional, focusing on supporting the high schoolers and building their confidence. We asked students if they competed that day and how they felt about their performance. We congratulated them on their hard work. We also found occasions to segue into how Toastmasters helps individuals improve communication skills to achieve success.
This successful community outreach event shows that Toastmasters can successfully guide our future generations to excellence.
