I was very impressed with the way things came together for the presentation tonight. Though a lot of planning had lead up to this day, the concept of an online conference was still pretty vague to me until it finally came together. Our challenge was to keep the presentation consistent and in the spirit of what International Stuttering Awareness Day (ISAD) is all about...reaching out and including PWS in the discussion no matter how far they may live from where the discussion is taking place. Which actually puts the discussion in every person's home...or Blackberry, or laptop, etc. To include those who have felt so unincluded.

14 physically gathered in the telecon room at Alliant International University in San Francisco tonight, and we were also joined by 2 conference callers, Gary from Pennsylvania and John from San Ramon. The conference call lines were open to anybody who wanted to call in and listen to and/or participate in the presentations. Five presentations were given tonight....

1) Michael Sugarman- "Introduction and ISAD Explanation"...Introduction to the presentation and ISAD. He illustrated that we as PWS are not alone by showing a slideshow of the many faces of stuttering, played to music of "The Scatman" who was an advocate for PWS as a PWS himself.

2) Nina Ghiselli- "Reframing the Iceberg"... Nina's alternative to Joe Sheehan's analogy of the iceberg, which compares the stutter to the tip of the iceberg. Below the tip is the base, which is much larger in comparison. The base is compared to the feelings of fear, shame, guilt,  anxiety, hopelessness, isolation, and denial which can perpetuate the stutter. In contrast to Sheehan's analogy, Nina offered her own- the base of the iceberg might include courage, authenticity, pride, forgiveness, peace, hope, community, and acceptance. This shift in thinking comes from the self-help movement and finding community.

3) Josh Denault- "Methods of Outreach"... Different community outreach approaches for our 3 events, as well as the support group in general, were discussed. His presentation showed the way we linked our group/website to other organizations/people in the Bay Area.  A recap of the Hayward bi-lingual event and the Teen Open House event were given at the end.

4) Mike Garcia- "The Word is Mightier than the Sword"... Arguments and confrontations are unavoidable in life and can be especially troublesome for PWS since we tend to become more disfluent when we argue. By using a recent, personal experience, I talked about how you don't have to be fluent to succeed in an argument. Preparation and personal conviction are more powerful.

5) Vanna Nicks- "Communication Over Fluency"... Fluency is not a component of successful social interaction. Instead of trying to increase fluency, PWS could focus on aspects of effective communication to achieve success. Communication strategies and tools were discussed in the presentation.

After the oral presentations, we moved to the computer lab so that we could explore SutteringHomePage.com. This is an online forum for discussions, research papers, and personal experiences to be shared with anyone from around the world. If you haven't checked this out, I strongly encourage you to. The evening concluded with dinner at a nearby restaurant for those who could stay.

The "International" theme hit home for me later when I learned that the powerpoint presentations, complete with audio, will be posted online on StutteringHomePage.com for all to view at a convenience of their own, no matter where they live. We're also going to post this on our Bay Area NSA website.

We'd like to thank Mr. Mel Hoffman for attending tonight. Mel is a big reason why the NSA is here today, and we enjoyed being in his company tonight. I'd also like to send a heartful thank you to Vanna Nicks. Vanna is a recent addition to the East Bay Chapter, and she hasn't wasted any time in getting involved. She gave a great presentation tonight and brings a contagious energy to the group. I hope she continues to be as involved.

Thanks to all that came tonight,

-Mike Garcia