Junior Black Belt

[Truestar]

Does your school make use of the Junior Black Belt rank? If so what does it look like?

Our school has a black belt with a white stripe through the middle, now it's a horizontal split between black and red. My instructor has had the idea that maybe our junior black belts will have a solid black belt, with no terminology or stripes on it, and reserve the stitching for full dan ranks.

How about your school?

[Ranpu]

well, in the school I went to, I only seen 2 black belts in class, my sensei, he was a 2nd degree black belt and sensei Joe Swift, but as far as I remember, we didn't have junior ranks

[the beast]

Our school has junior belt ranks but we use the same belts as adults, but when the kids reach bb they come to the adult class and start at green belt .

[tori]

Allegedly we have junior ranks, but everyone has the same belt. That is one of the things I wish was done differently at our school, but it's not my school.

[tallgeese]

Yes, I utilize junoir ranks. I think it's important to teach good fundimentals to younger kids, but they can't and shouldn't be allowed to practice highly combative stuff 'till they've had a chance to mature a bit.

For instance, we don't teach eye gouging and stuff to lower aged kids. Nor do we show them how to utilize or defend agaisnt a blade. We also have a mandantory firearms portion required for bb, obviously you can't ask a kid to do that.

For the junior ranks, we use a -so suffex on the certificate, for adult ranks it's the -jutsu suffex. That serves to delinate the two. There is no differece in the actual look of the belt or uniform.

For the really young kids, I don't even rank them. They earn stripes on their while belts, which they will keep until they are old enough to train in the -do version of the system. Then it's all the way through again. This stuff is mainly prepatory work for really learning later, not necissarly learning right now.

Bear in mind, this is just how my group runs and a bulk of the people I work with are adults. The younger rankings are largely theoretical now aside for a couple of exceptions. That's the structure listed in the handbook I work out of anyway.

[Tiger1962]

My school doesn't have a "junior" black belt level --- although I think it's a good idea to have this to separate the adult black belts from the much younger ones.

[bushido_man96]

Our school does not use a Junior ranking system.

[tallgeese]

That begs the question, bushido man, what do you think of a junior ranking system? Would it be a handy thing to have in your opinion, or an overcomplicating factor?

Just curious.

[bushido_man96]

That begs the question, bushido man, what do you think of a junior ranking system? Would it be a handy thing to have in your opinion, or an overcomplicating factor?

Just curious.

Ok, since you ask, I'll answer in two parts.

1. My school really is not much more than a curriculum-based school. What I mean by that is that we do basics, forms, one-steps, and sparring in class, and testing is based on if you know your forms and one-steps well enough to be allowed to test. Other than this, we don't delve much into other things (much to my chagrin, but that's another topic entirely...). So, for the purpose of what rank is in our school, I see no need for it.

2. If material tends to become more combative in nature, with more emphasis put on when and how you use what you learn, and based on things like laws, the use-of-force ladder, etc, then I do think that it would be an asset to have a junior ranking system.

I'll admit that I kind of ride the fence on the junior black belt thing. I don't know that it is a necessity or not. However, the more arguements I see about the junior rank, the more I think I begin to prefer it.

[DWx]

No for us. We don't have junior ranks as such but the org lays down age limits for the dan ranks. In practice its not strictly adhered to and by most standards they are fairly low anyway. If you're not the right age it just means you can't send away for your certificates yet and can't compete on international level (not really a problem for most to be honest). Once kids get to 1st dan they often stay there for years until they are mature enough to grade again anyway.