The Return to Delusion.

[ps1]

This is the reason (well, one of them) why I like the idea of a 'Guest Belt' completely outside the normal colors. 'You have some unspecified training in a different school, but you arent ranked here.. here, wear this black-and-white stripe belt till you test.'

I never considered that before. That's a really, really good idea. I can see that solving a lot of problems.

This was used with alot of success when I trained karate. No one every complained about it. Even the kids who thought they were "all that" accepted it with no problems. Usually we just let them wear it until we felt they could test at a level near where they were in the past. Helps them save face and you don't have to seem like a bad guy. Win-Win

[bushido_man96]

This is the reason (well, one of them) why I like the idea of a 'Guest Belt' completely outside the normal colors. 'You have some unspecified training in a different school, but you arent ranked here.. here, wear this black-and-white stripe belt till you test.'

I never considered that before. That's a really, really good idea. I can see that solving a lot of problems.

This was used with alot of success when I trained karate. No one every complained about it. Even the kids who thought they were "all that" accepted it with no problems. Usually we just let them wear it until we felt they could test at a level near where they were in the past. Helps them save face and you don't have to seem like a bad guy. Win-Win

That is a good idea.

[kensei]

Here is a twist on the story....had a friend of mine join us for Karate, he was not the most "consistent" student and would train for a few weeks, take a few off. He managed to train and test up to Green belt, but at Green he took four months off! Then came back and after a month of "semi-consistent" training wanted to test for purple belt!

When I told him that he was not eligible till he put in three months minimum training and knew his Kata well enough he said "then I think I am going to walk away"...after calling him weekly to get him to come out and reminding him of class...i had enough and said "Fine, you are done, thats your choice!" and left it at that. We talk all the time because he is a good friend of mine...but I did not poke or prod him once, and last week he called and said he wanted to start up again.

I am not going to push anyone to train, what you put in is what you get out of Karate and the Juice is worth the squeeze as it were! If he comes back and gets better he can test, but I dont bend rules! Not for friends and not for students.

[Harlan]

LOL! Good...called him on it.

I recall teasing my teacher, just once, about quitting. His reply:

'Good ahead. I don't need you to train.'

Keeping it real.

Here is a twist on the story....had a friend of mine join us for Karate, he was not the most "consistent" student and would train for a few weeks, take a few off. He managed to train and test up to Green belt, but at Green he took four months off! Then came back and after a month of "semi-consistent" training wanted to test for purple belt!

When I told him that he was not eligible till he put in three months minimum training and knew his Kata well enough he said "then I think I am going to walk away"...after calling him weekly to get him to come out and reminding him of class...i had enough and said "Fine, you are done, thats your choice!" and left it at that. We talk all the time because he is a good friend of mine...but I did not poke or prod him once, and last week he called and said he wanted to start up again.

I am not going to push anyone to train, what you put in is what you get out of Karate and the Juice is worth the squeeze as it were! If he comes back and gets better he can test, but I dont bend rules! Not for friends and not for students.

[CredoTe]

We've experienced this issue several times in the past, also. We train in Matsubayashi-Ryu: if a student comes to us that has no training in Matsubayashi-Ryu, s/he starts as a white belt, period.

When we receive a "transfer" student from another school that trains in Matsubayashi-Ryu, we have the transfer student try out a week of classes to see if s/he likes and can handle them. We also use the time to silently evaluate the transfer student's skill / progress level and gauge what kyu s/he would be at according to our standards (regardless of her/his current rank).

After the week of classes, we have a private meeting with the student (and parents if s/he is a child) to inform her/him of her/his rank. We then give the student a choice: take the rank as we evaluated, or keep current rank from other school BUT s/he must wait to test in order to improve her/his skills up to our standards for her/his current kyu rank. If the transfer student is stuck at her/his current rank for a year, so be it.

As for a "guest belt", that's a good idea. However, we don't use a guest belt because there's only been one transfer student we've had in which this student's current rank color matched ours. All the others came from schools that use different color schemes for their kyu system. If, in the future, we find we receive a higher number of transfer students with a similar kyu color scheme, we'll revisit the guest belt idea.

[JusticeZero]

Guest belts work well for students from schools where the belt colors don't match; it indicates that they have some form of training, but they are a wild card who has yet to find their place in your ranking system. This would be the belt you hand a transfer student or guest when they first walk in.

[CredoTe]

Guest belts work well for students from schools where the belt colors don't match; it indicates that they have some form of training, but they are a wild card who has yet to find their place in your ranking system. This would be the belt you hand a transfer student or guest when they first walk in.

Oops... Looks like I was "corn"-fused and got the idea backwards...lol Thanks for clearing that up!