The ESU Friendly International Forum is an informal forum aimed at exchanging views, with an underlying aim of building future collaborations and initiatives. The host of the FIF moves between different ESUs internationally and each forum centres around a topic selected by the hosting nation.
The topic of this fourth FIF, hosted by our Polish colleagues, will be: ‘What motivates us to promote public speaking in our respective countries?’
The ESU has always been a conduit to share and exchange views, but within the wider international family of the ESU there is more that can be done! It is our hope that FIF will bring the international members of the ESU closer together and lead us all in exciting directions as we listen and learn from one other.
Date: Monday, 13 June 2022, 1pm BST
Register in advance for this meeting:
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86471211392?pwd=MXNOR3Awa3R2OGZkUG1xTWFpcFluUT09
Meeting passcode: AYdPG3
Please see below for a message from Alina, Chair of ESU Poland:
Dear ESU members, inspired by the 3rd FIF hosted by Dominga Chamorro representing Chile, we would like you to take you to a different corner of the world, Poland – so far away, yet so close.
As is the case with the countries we have not visited, the associations may be limited to famous people, events or even stereotypes, often confused with those of our neighbours. Visiting a country, however, often changes the perspective. Poland has always been considered a hospitable place, but also a community in which two people may have three contradicting opinions, according to an old joke. We have weaknesses and virtues, but public speakers we are not. This shortcoming may result from the character of our educational system, only now gradually shifting the main focus from knowledge to skills, or may be rooted elsewhere. Yet, since 1999 we have not missed an International Public Speaking Competition and our young speakers make us proud and happy.
The meeting to which we would like to invite you will be hosted by this year’s winner of the National Finals in Poland – Julia Smuczynska and her sister Sara, who represented Poland at the International Public Speaking Competition in 2011 and is now one of the organizers. The question we would like to ask ourselves and each other is what motivates us to promote public speaking in our respective countries.
