need some guidance

[Agnus]

I belong to a Toastmasters Club. We reciently received an invitation from a Gavel Club (an affiliate of Toastmasters) that exist within a prision. The invitation is for any of our members visit or guest speak at thier club.

I would like to respond. I am an RN and I would like to guest speak. However, I was thinking I would like to offer the gavel club a choise of subject matter.

I was thinking that I would give them some background on some of the general areas that I can and am willing to speak on : Health and wellness, personal development, story telling, communication skills.

What do you think about this? Also, as correctional nurses is there a topic that you would suggest would be ideal. After all we often see a need that is not recognized by the client (patient).

I have a P. O. Box but I do not want them to know the community that I live in (very small) and the address to reply is to the prisoner (club president) directly. We have several prisions in the city where this is to be and I am unable to identify which medium security prision it is.

I am guessing that I should try to contact the prision athorities directly and ask them to act as intermediaries in delivering my letter so that my return address does not appear on the material the prisioner receives. This will require a reply and there fore someone will need access to my address inorder to make the reply.

I don't know were to start to accomplish this.

I would like to respond but writing directly to a prisioner with my contact info is not something I feel is particularly wise.

Thank you for your help in this.

P. S. Toastmaster is an organization who's sole purpose it to help its members develop communications and leadership skills. Gavel Clubs do the samething. What makes them different is that they do not meet certain criteria for being a Toastmaster Club, example age (high school), and clubs located in prison.

[karbyr]

yes, contact the authorities at the prison..........the response address from the prisoner should give you a clue, sometimes you can look up locations/addresses from your states web site under dept of corrections or similar.

Any health related matter could help..........some of the biggest problems we have on a recurring basis are

1. Overuse and overdosing themselves with OTC medications (if a little works, more will be better)

2. Noncompliance with prescribed medications ..............I don't feel bad today, why should I take pills

3. Poor understanding of basic health concepts.......hygiene, germs, etc.

Good Luck!

[Agnus]

Thanks. I'll have to give some of these topics some thought to come up with a presentation that they will listen to and gleem something from.

I never like lecturing at people and these sound like some challenging areas