Police and Informative Speech Outline free essay sample

Asking a rhetorical question is a favourite for speechmakers. The introduction can take as long as you want, but it’s usually best to keep it short. You might want to start with a video or a short slide of images. Fit these things into your informative speech outline template if it’s relevant. Body The body is simple in principle. You delve into your main points, as well as any sub points you have. Assuming you’ve successfully made it through the introduction, length is your biggest threat. It’s tempting to cover every base you have and every possible question. This can actually turn against you, though. Allow the audience to ask questions. It encourages debate and keeps people engaged. It also gives their minds a break from watching and listening to you. Just run through your points. How you do this is entirely up to you. Try to use multiple forms of media to keep interest levels high. But avoid using the same type of media for each point you make. Don’t milk it. Allow each point to have its own unique form of delivery. Conclusion Finish strongly. You can briefly reiterate your points, but keep this short and confined to the main points. Explain, again, the point of the speech and open the floor to questions. It’s best to invite the audience to participate as quickly as possible because the points remain fresh in their minds. Studies have shown how building on these things quickly has far more positive results than droning on and on and on. An informative speech outline template is great for providing some order to the chaos of preparing a speech, but don’t let it trap you. Break the boundaries and make your own slightly different template. Just use this as a starting point, before adapting it to your specific speech. SAMPLES If you’re sitting here at town hall tonight, it means you want answers. You’re here on your own time because you care about this town—and you want to make sure I care about it as much as you do. You want to make sure I’ll bring real solutions with me to office, not just bandages. Well, I’m not going to waste any of your time. My main focus today is your children. â€Å"Children are our future. † It’s a phrase we hear often, but it is often used without a full understanding of the implications. Children are our future† means that children are our priority. Right now, we have some of the lowest test scores in the entire county. Not only that, our math and science scores were around 20 points lower than the state average. That is not making children our priority. That is not securing their future or the future of this town. No one wants to move to a town or stay in a town that has, to be frank, a lousy public education system. When I was a child here, our town was actually renowned for its stellar schools, so what changed over the last thirty years? For one thing, an exorbitantly high percentage of the town’s budget has been allocated to parks, recreation, and beautification. Not to say that money was wasted—we have an extraordinarily gorgeous town—but pristine streets won’t help our students compete at a national level when it comes time to picking a college. On top of that, we have a staff that is rife with teachers who have been offered tenure despite a long track record of under-performing students. During my time as superintendent of schools 10 years ago, I tried to push for a merit-based tenureship. It didn’t go through, and I’ve been pushing ever since. I think the most valuable change we can make as a town is ensuring that our teaching staff is filled with individuals who strive for perfection rather than settling for what’s merely acceptable. And what better way to motivate our schools than to give them a more appropriate budget? More money invested in our schools means a lower student-to-teacher ratio, which means student will be getting the attention they need and will have a better chance of fulfilling their true potential. The Office of the Mayor should be held by an individual who can actually bring solutions that will change the town for the better. This town needs a drastic new approach before it’s too late. If we do things the way that they’ve always been done, then things will remain the way that they’ve always been. And that, at this point, means a continued decline in the quality of public education. Not meeting state standards is gross negligence and completely unacceptable. Don’t let it get any worse. I will not let this town go another year at the bottom of the totem pole. If you will elect me as your public servant, will serve this town and the needs of its people. Those needs will change over time, but right now, as of today, the top priority is education, knowledge—the most precious and valuable resource a person can have. Vote Mahoney this Tuesday, and you’ll be voting a promising new future for this town and its youngest residents. SAMPLE 2 With the wide availability of video taping equipment these days—from cellphone cameras to mounted motorcycle helmet cameras—police officers are finding that their every move is subject to the scrutiny of thousands of people once the footage hits the Internet. More often than not, this footage is posted in order to expose police behavior than some deem â€Å"brutal. † Commenters throw out phrases like â€Å"excessive force† and â€Å"unconstitutional,† while police departments hit back stating that officers acted appropriately and according to police guideline. In some cases, notably the Rodney King case and the Dole family case, evidence makes it clear that the behavior of responding officers was inappropriate and of a brutal nature. It’s not always that clear cut, though, is it? An officer shown on tape throws a woman to the ground, kneels on her back and handcuffs her wrists. This imagery in and of itself is shocking and disturbing enough for viewers to call out â€Å"police brutality† as a knee jerk reaction. However, it’s not the whole story. Before this shot, the woman was belligerent and violent, resisting arrest and spewing threats while officers calmly tried to subdue her. Another case shows a young man being hurled into storage lockers by an officer in a school setting. The action is made all the more extreme when footage before the attack shows the young man calmly walking down the hall. His offense? Ignoring the officer’s demand that he tuck in his shirt. And then there’s the infamous pepper spray officer, shown spraying a thick stream of chemicals in the faces of peaceful Occupy protesters. The protesters are sitting on the ground motionless, heads down, arms linked. From public streets to public schools, all of these cases involved police force—some warranted, some possibly not. However, the true uniting factor is the presence of a video camera. It is in video evidence that we have proof. While some cases require a strong-arm response from the police, the resistance of some officers against the presence of civilian videotaping doesn’t look very good, does it? If police force is not brutal and not excessive, then why have such a hostile response toward the video camera? If anything, it’s there as an ally. The people who should fear recording are those who don’t want their actions used as evidence. Officers should have nothing to fear if they truly are observing proper protocol. Most importantly, it is not illegal in any way to videotape an officer’s activity in the public. A motorcyclist with a video camera attached to his helmet was cleared of all charges levied against him for taping an officer who pulled him over for speeding and other riding violations. The judge concluded, being in a public space, there was no way to find any illegality in the rider’s actions. However, this did not stop the police department from searching his home and seizing his computer and storage drives first. This was a clear violation of this man’s rights and all the more reason to have a video recording device on you at all times. If an officer, or anyone for that matter, is displaying unacceptable behavior, a recording is the best evidence you can have. Not all officer force is excessive; however, the ones who cross the line need to be stopped. That’s where you come in. SAMPLE 3 here to talk to you about changing your life. A lot of people I talk to treat their life like it’s some sort of sentient machine that moves continuously, independently, at its own pace. They feel like cogs in that machine, watching passively as it takes its course. They don’t realize just how much control they actually have over their lives. What I need you to do is look at your life as if it is a movie and you are the director. This is your movie. You choose the actors and the scenes. There can be as many plot twists as you want and, if David Lynch is any proof, your movie doesn’t have to make sense at all. It can be as wild or as calm as you want, and it is never ever too late to turn the film on its head, scream â€Å"CUT,† and start from scratch. So your life’s in a rut. Maybe you do the same thing every day and the repetition is slowly driving you crazy. Maybe you’re at a point where you just want peace and quiet, but all you have is instability and stress. Very often, I hear people tell me they just need a good vacation. The problem with that lies in the fact that you are taking a vacation from your life. You do not want to be in a position where you are trying to get away from your life. If you’ve begun to feel like this, it’s time to think about introducing real change. First of all, you don’t need to turn your life on its head. Often, making little changes will make a big impact. The physical states of our bodies often take a major toll on our minds and emotions. You need to be selfish and make time for yourself, even if you have kids—especially if you have kids. Take just 30 minutes—do it at 5:30 in the morning if you have to—and work out. Kickbox, run, do pilates, dance, do something physically invigorating to wake yourself up. It’s good for your heart and will get your endorphins pumping. Any spare moment you have, do squats, stretch, run in place, do calf lifts or pull ups on your door. You will start feeling more limber and physically stronger, which will then in turn make you feel mentally stronger. Second, start teaching yourself again. A lot of people act like just because they’re out of school they can’t lean anymore. Learning doesn’t stop after college. Don’t watch TV. Don’t sit on the computer looking at pictures of cats. Learn a language. There are free language learning tools online, and they work. Teach yourself to paint. Teach yourself anything. You are more capable than you think. Enroll in free online college classes. You can advance your career and life in so many ways by becoming more knowledgeable. If you hate your job and have to coax yourself into going every morning, chances are you’re in need of a career change. Go back to school. I don’t care how old you are. Apply for those grants. Get those loans. Do it. Will it be hard? Yes. It will be challenging and expensive, but you’ll pay it back over time. And, ultimately, the alternative is just doing the same thing you were doing before you came here to listen to me. Not good. Third, volunteer. I hear it all the time: â€Å"I would love to do something, but I just don’t have time. † And I’m calling you out on that excuse. Of course you have time. How much time do you spend in front of the TV, vegging out to those shows you recorded on the DVR. I can tell you right now that getting off the couch and helping someone less fortunate is going to be much more rewarding than that most recent episode of 30 Rock. Sometimes, the best thing a person can do with his or her life is dedicating a portion of it to helping where help is needed. The best thing you can do is take responsibility. Far too often we blame circumstance and even other people for our current situation. â€Å"This is just my life,† â€Å"It’s too late for me to just change,† â€Å"I can’t† these are all statements used as excuses to justify the continuation of a destructive pattern of behavior and avoid actually doing something about it. You don’t need to wait until next week to evaluate your priorities and decide that you want to do a 180. This is your life and you’ve only got one. You’re responsible for how it goes and no one else. You have one shot. You don’t get a do-over. It doesnt matter how old you are. It’s only too late when you flatline. Make this count.