It took almost a year to convince myself to attend a Toastmasters meeting. I wanted to get over my…read morefear of public speaking and gain confidence when speaking in front of people. In July, I finally forced myself to attend a meeting and I am so glad I did! I've been attending Surf City Speak-n-Lead Toastmasters for about 6 weeks now and I've already learned quite a bit. This group's friendly, warm, and safe environment has helped me begin to build confidence in myself and my words without judgment, ridicule or criticism. The critiques are encouraging and is helping me develop into a stronger speaker. As a writer, words come easily, but voicing them out loud always has been an issue. I struggle especially with impromptu speaking and this group helps in not only prepared speeches but also improv speaking skills. The members go out of their way to make you feel genuinely welcome as well as help you with any questions and advice. Meetings are very well organized and the food is surprisingly good (I'm not typically a fan of restaurants like IHOP). I actually look forward to Wednesday nights every week and am excited to continue to learn and grow my skills with the help of this club.

Pretty fun group of people. Meeting every Wednesday makes it easy to get the most of what I was…read morelooking for in a toastmaster club. 5 stars because of the location is easy to get to and park, food available, and long term members who are always there to help. I encourage anyone who is looking for a well organized club to visit and give #6570 a try! :)

We live in the bay area in northern CA. My son has been with ModernBrain (remotely) for 3 years and…read moreis heading to high school after this summer. He learned so much from Modernbrain's dedicated and knowledgeable coaches. He also built a lasting friendship with his peers in Modernbrain who share the same passion with him. Our experience with ModernBrain is nothing but great. I would highly recommend it to anyone who might start exploring interst or would like to sharpen skills in specific speech/debate category. BTW, their tuition and tournament fee is very reasonable and transparent, not like some other instituitions in the bay area.

Extremely Disappointing Experience. I Would NOT Recommend Modern Brain!…read more Overall Experience I feel compelled to share our experience so other parents can make an informed decision before spending their money. My son enrolled at Modern Brain for the first time this semester after having a great experience at Cogito Debate. Unfortunately, our experience with Modern Brain has been disappointing in nearly every aspect. Instruction and Curriculum My concerns include the instructor (Kyle), the curriculum, the overall quality of instruction, and the lack of visible progress. My son has been attending for approximately two months, and I honestly cannot identify anything meaningful he has learned or any improvement in his public speaking skills. Feedback and Progress Reports The progress report we received was incredibly disappointing. Rather than providing useful feedback on my son's speaking abilities, strengths, weaknesses, or areas for improvement, the instructor continued to focus on behavioral concerns he had raised during the very first week of class. I enrolled my son to develop his confidence, communication skills, and public speaking abilities--not to repeatedly hear about his classroom behavior without meaningful information about his academic progress. Transparency Parents are not permitted to observe classes, and we aren't given opportunities to watch our children's speeches. How are parents supposed to evaluate their child's progress when we can't see their work and receive virtually no substantive feedback? Refund Policy After expressing my dissatisfaction, I requested a prorated refund for the remaining unused classes. They refused. This is an expensive semester-long program, and it's incredibly frustrating to feel that you're paying for instruction that isn't delivering the educational value you were promised, yet have no option to recover the money for classes your child won't attend. Facility The actual classroom location is not the impressive large white building featured in the website photos. Our classes were held in a much less appealing shared space with Little Dynasty, a Chinese language school. I found the difference between the online presentation and the actual facility misleading. Recommendation For the amount of money Modern Brain charges, I expected qualified instruction, a structured curriculum, meaningful progress reports, transparency, and a genuine commitment to helping children become better speakers. Unfortunately, our experience fell far short of those expectations. I can't speak for every instructor or family, but based on our experience, I would strongly discourage other parents from enrolling their children at Modern Brain. There are better options out there. I wish I had known all of this before enrolling my son. Save your money and look elsewhere.

Very professional and had a lot of great input and exercises for not only voice coaching but public…read morespeaking that I couldn't find elsewhere. I highly recommend Patricia as a voice coach!

From the owner: I speak for meetings, retreats, corporate events, and companies, groups, and organizations of all…read morekinds. Well-versed in arts and entertainment and with background in business and education, I am a versatile interview guest and inspirational presenter. Please note: I DO NOT coach individuals. I am an inspirational / educational speaker. Main topics: 'Get on with it! - The just "do it" mindset' and 'Living the Creative Life - Finding and carving your path through the obstacles, ups and downs, detours, segues, and alternate routes'. I am a voice actor (currently audio description for Fox Sports), SAG-AFTRA member, and Emmy Award-winning writer providing voice and on-camera services for podcasts, films, TV, and more. Please note that I do not coach individuals.

Very good place.. it's my kids second year and we love it .. my other son joined this yearread more

As soon as my son first participated in his school's debate program, he finally found his life's…read morepassion. Unfortunately, when he switched to a school without a debate program, he no longer had access to it. New England Academy came to the rescue. My son found it incredibly instructional and supportive. Not only did he improve his speech and debate skills, but he was able to take on leadership opportunities. His critical thinking skills have also improved and have been inherently applied to his school work. Mr. Hughes and Mr. Hobbs are more than teachers. Their individualized instruction and ability to connect with children makes the program resemble a family activity rather than simply an academic program. They have created a safe environment where making mistakes is constructive and team work is emphasized. My high school son is now an OCDL middle school assistant coach, judge, trusted mentor and friend - which are additional life skills he picked up from Mr. Hughes and Mr. Hobbs.

We've been coming to OC Speech Services for over a year now, and I'm so thankful we found them. My…read moreson receives both OT and speech therapy here, and it's been amazing to see how much he's grown since starting. We've had the opportunity to work with several wonderful therapists, and we're grateful for all of them. I'd also like to mention his speech therapists, Ms. Dana and Ms. Jena, and Mr. Joseph (OT therapist) to who have been such an important part of his progress. They've taken the time to get to know my son, incorporate his interests into each session, and keep him engaged and motivated to learn. They also do a great job keeping us involved by sharing his progress after each session and giving us ideas for what we can continue working on at home. Watching my son grow in his communication skills has been incredibly rewarding. We know that progress didn't happen overnight, and we're so grateful for the patience, encouragement, and dedication his therapists have shown him. We're so thankful we found OC Speech Services and couldn't ask for a better team to be part of my son's journey.

Arianna has been an amazing speech therapist for our daughter, Lucille. Over the past two years,…read moreLucille has gone from using very few understandable words and struggling to produce many speech sounds correctly to speaking in full sentences, asking and answering questions, following conversations, and expressing her needs much more clearly. Her speech intelligibility has improved tremendously, and her confidence has grown along with it. Arianna is patient, knowledgeable, and consistently made therapy engaging while giving us practical activities to reinforce skills at home. Her dedication and genuine care played a huge role in Lucille's progress. We are incredibly grateful for everything she has done and highly recommend her.

Our daughter just graduated/completed her speech here in just about over a year or so. Weekly on…read moreSaturdays for the most part, only switching to a weekday for the last few months at the end of summer. Her speech is beyond what it was when we brought her in, and now, she can identify and self-correct herself. She's amazed at how she spoke and sounded when watching old videos of herself. The staff has always been caring and professional. Sure, there were scheduling conflicts, both planned and unplanned, on their end as well as ours. All of it handled well in light of ever-changing situations. They've been responsive to our inquiries, and kept us in the loop about our daughter's progress. We are thrilled we found Speech Point, and even more so that they were able to help our daughter correct her speech!

After going to 3 other speech clinics that wasn't helping my daughter, I took her here and got the…read morecorrect, precise assessment done. For the past 10 months we've worked with Andrea and Kelsey. My daughter says words with sounds she wasn't able to do before. She also has so much fun. The sessions are engaging and the toys are always different so it motivates her to target goals. From what I've seen, all the therapist are super positive and ready to jump in and WORK HARD. The SLP's use every moment as an opportunity to help target my daughter's speech goals. At first I didn't think 30 minutes would be enough time. Nope, I was wrong. Without Andrea and Kelsey's expertise, my daughter wouldn't be saying the words she says now. I've been with other clinics with my other children too. Speech Point really is a top notch clinic. I have to add: The owner is really nice and easy to talk to. She's busy doing assessments all the time but she'll make time to chat when requested. Just ask. Courtney and Temika are on top of the scheduling and behind the scenes tasks. They always respond via text, email or by phone. There's some scheduling issues at the moment due to short staffing but management has been giving updates and the owner is stepping in to help. I can't thank the team enough for helping my daughter so much this past year.

Made huge improvements in only 2 days! Mr. Powers is very kind and easy to work with. I recommend…read morethis program to anyone who suffers from stuttering!

I don't even know if this guy is still in business, but this is long overdue. I worked with Mark…read morePowers several years ago and what a waste of time and money. I had to take time off work to see him and when we did the speech excerises he put me on this machine and made me read out loud while he sat on his computer online shopping. I would not recommend and I still stutter even trying his "techniques". I swear you can find all the material he gives you on google. It's a joke

Dr. Ansari is both brilliant and and intuitive. Her team is spectacular (we are BEYOND impressed…read morewith therapist, Christina!). My daughter is actually EAGER to attend her educational therapy sessions to learn how to work with her learning disabilities. The extremely thorough testing is extremely multi-layered & comprehensive - and they are compassionate and willing to help find a way to make the pricing and payments work. Once the results are in, they are MORE than equipped to help their clients over come their issues. BEYOND impressed!

Very nice people to work with and excellent advice. Both my boys were having problems with…read morestandardized testing and I found out much more to help them academically from having them tested. One of my sons was very depressed and felt safe in their care to express how badly he was feeling. It sounds dramatic but this office saved his life. Looking back as a parent, sending my boys to this office was one of the best things I ever did.

Finding Jessica Owens at Seaside Speech Therapy was such a relief. She truly helped me understand…read morewhat speech therapy involves and made me feel comfortable with the process for my daughter. Jessica worked with our schedules and was understanding and supportive of my coparenting situation. Her patience, flexibility, and compassion meant so much to me. I'm grateful to have found someone who made us feel supported, and I highly recommend her to families looking for a caring speech therapist.

Jessica was absolutely wonderful with our daughter! She was 6 years old at the time and needed help…read morewith articulation and phonology, and couldn't pronounce her "R" sounds. Jessica made speech therapy fun and comfortable, and our daughter absolutely loved working with her. She helped her correct her "R" sounds in less than a year, and we couldn't be happier with the results. We're so grateful for Jessica's patience, kindness, and expertise. Highly recommend her to any family looking for a speech therapist.

Pretty fun I did a year and was very fun and a very great learning experience great time.read more

Hi, I called to inquire about the summer program, and when I was told it was $900 a week, my jaw…read morehonestly dropped. That pricing makes the program completely out of reach for many middle-class families. At nearly $4,000 a month, especially in Orange County where families are already struggling just to cover rent and basic expenses, it feels pretty outrageous. I really hope your team reconsiders the cost of the program or offers more affordable options for working families. Programs like this should be accessible to more kids, not just families with extremely high incomes.