It began with a call from the BSA office - a willing volunteer was needed to speak about the BSA at a meeting of an Inner Wheel group in the Midlands.

Colin Marsh

The Ladies had asked me to talk about stammering and the BSA, which is what I did, interspersing the talk with anecdotes about my own and other people's experiences. Fortunately, as many of the group were about my own age - born in the years just after World War II - a lot of my references to being a child with a stammer in the 1950's struck a chord. A gracious 'vote of thanks' followed, and the Treasurer handed me a donation for BSA.

I am firmly convinced that events such as this are an excellent way of helping to raise the profile of BSA. Those 19 ladies will, I hope, talk to their husbands, partners, children, friends and colleagues about what they heard from me that evening and, hopefully, further invitations to address groups like Inner Wheel, Rotary, WI, etc., will follow.

I would urge any member who feels that they would like to help BSA by giving talks like this to put themselves forward. I know that public speaking is not easy - and can be doubly hard for people who stammer - but it is a wonderful way of 'letting the stammer be heard' and raising the profile of stammering and the BSA. Once I had conquered my nerves, and realised that without the expected Powerpoint facilities, I was on my own, I had a great evening, made some new and useful contacts - and got a free dinner out of it!

Colin Marsh

From the Winter 2008 Speaking Out, page 5. Link to longer version of article.