Issues & Opportunities of Non-English Clubs In Your District From my phone conversations with district officers around the world I became aware of a growing number of non-English toastmasters clubs such as Spanish, French, Mandarin, Japanese, Taiwanese, etc. The district officers who are mostly unable to speak these languages are often at a loss on what to do with them especially with their feeling of being a “stepchild” within the mainstream English clubs. In my three years as district officer I have had to grapple with this issue since 20% of our clubs are non-English clubs involving 4+ languages, Mandarin, Taiwanese, Japanese, Hakka and bilinguals. Therefore, I would like to offer my experience that may be useful to district officers who are facing similar issues. As LGM, one of my first challenge was the realignment of our growing district which in 2002 numbered sixty-three clubs. I took the opportunity to organize the non-English clubs into a separate division and each language group into areas. The first benefit is we were able to conduct officers training in Mandarin for the non-English speaking officers. For Division Governor we looked for someone who speaks English as well as two or more of the other languages. That Division Governor then becomes the key district communication/management bridge to the non-English clubs. With that reorganization we were able to hold language specific activities such as contest etc. The next step for us was to connect with other districts which have the same languages. For example, our Japanese clubs maintain close network relationship with the Japanese clubs in District 76 in Japan. One of our Mandarin clubs cooperated with the forty some Mandarin clubs in Districts 51 and 80 in matters of common interests such as translations and speech contests. I have discovered that there are Mandarin clubs in Australia, Canada and the US who are struggling due to their isolation. If we could encourage these linguistically similar clubs to connect with each other through the internet it would give them a sense of belonging to a larger organization and gain from the benefits of group synergy. Instead of seeing these non-English clubs as a distraction and management headache we can see it as an opportunity for toastmasters growth in a totally new dimension and find unity in diversity. ~ George Yen, DTM, Candidate for 2nd Vice President |