What annoys you most about some MA Schools?

[chiliphil1]

Dislikes:

Anywhere called xxxx's Black Belt Academy AMEN

Anywhere that has classes for lil' dragons. ninjas or tigers. Or anything else preceded by lil'. My old school had a juniors class called the power rangers. Now it's just the rangers.

Anywhere that has a 'program' that has to be 'signed up' for. Usually called the Black belt club, sometimes it's a legit money saving plan for the long term practitioner but usually it's a scam of some sort.

Anywhere you have to pay more than a few £/$ for a grading. Or hundreds per month for normal classes.

Anywhere they wear more than one patch on their gi. (maybe 2) We used to wear the style patch on left breast, American flag on left arm, other patches on right arm (asst instructor, bbclub, full split, leadership team, swat team, academic achiever) for a little while we could earn colored stars to be worn on the lapel but that went away pretty quickly.

Anywhere that tells you not to wash your belt. Agreed

Stupid kiai's (eesaaaaaaaaaaah) Eh

Screaming out the name of the kata so that nobody can actually understand it. Never made sense with the military either.. Do drill instructors really like recruits screaming at them?

Extremely dramatic walk outs onto the mat for kata competition. I will tell you a short story. When I tested for BB we had to do an elbow strike to break a board, every other person would take sloooow dramatic "practice" hits on the board, probably 5-6 times per person, I thought it was dumb. I went up and just hit the board, why all the showy stuff? People thought what I did was funny though.

 

Team kata displays.Don't get me started

All of the things you mentioned are really on point. I think a lot of these are what have pulled MA down in my opinion to a sport more than a life style. While I balance on the edge of being happy someone is practicing MA even though they see it as a sport and being upset that someone looks at MA as a sport.. In the end I am glad there are so many who practice but I don't like the image that MA has gotten lately.

I also will add to your list by saying I don't like flashy looking uniforms.. I have seen every thing from multi color to golden uniforms with patches from one sleeve tip to the other and sashes over obi, and on and on..

[hammer]

Where can I start...

Actually I'm not sure what to add to other posts. Overall my issue is when a school is run like a business (it's fine to be run as a business). Running a school like a business results in the things that we all dislike...lax standards, coddling of students, "our school is the only school" mentality, too many attempts at one-size-fits-all MA, nickle and dime (or just plain high) fees, etc.

[DWx]

Dislikes:

Anywhere called xxxx's Black Belt Academy

Anywhere that has classes for lil' dragons. ninjas or tigers. Or anything else preceded by lil'.

Anywhere that has a 'program' that has to be 'signed up' for.

Anywhere you have to pay more than a few £/$ for a grading.

Anywhere they wear more than one patch on their gi. (maybe 2)

Anywhere that tells you not to wash your belt.

Stupid kiai's (eesaaaaaaaaaaah)

Screaming out the name of the kata so that nobody can actually understand it.

Extremely dramatic walk outs onto the mat for kata competition.

Team kata displays.

Maybe it's because I've grown a bit apathetic to what other people want to do in their own training but stuff like this doesn't bother me all that much. As sensei8 says "proof is on the floor". Skill speaks for itself and the quality of the students should far outweigh what their classes are called or whether they have patches on their gi.

(Though I would say don't wash you're belt because you'll shrink it!)

[bigpopparob2000]

Two particular things that annoy me endlessly are:

1. Schools that host birthday parties - Really? Believing a school can help people cultivate the warrior spirit and forge their bodies into living weapons is difficult when it's is also trying to compete with Chuck-E-Cheese.

2. Camouflage belts - For some reason, schools that have this belt always have it at the earlier ranks. I suspect doing so is a means of placating young students with a "cool" belt even when they're nowhere near to testing for 1st dan. The tactic stinks of flash over substance and really detracts from what may actually be a quality school.

[jaypo]

High fees aggravate me. I inquired about Muay Thai classes the other day, and it's either $150.00 per month or $40.00 per half hour!! I'm training unlimited times now for $35.00 per week in my current club! And it's all because they have to pay to offer the "insert organization name here" moniker with the classes. I now understand why my Sensei broke away from the international organizations.

I do the financials for my club, as I'm its treasurer. And we made plenty money last year being the least expensive club in the area. And I've sparred with numerous people higher ranked than I am at other clubs, and 9 of 10 times, I've won convincingly, so I can't see a reason to pay more than I'm paying now when it won't make me better than I am now.

It also annoys me when people can test for their Sandan rank in a 30 minute test. One of the "business" type M.A. clubs near us held their testing a few months ago, and my Sensei attended because he knew a few people there, and when he came back, he said that the 2nd degree black belts that were testing for 3rd degree only had to do 30 minutes of work.

[ps1]

Inconsistencies in training habits:

This is, of course, only viewed through the lens of my own experience.

In my TKD training and even Kung Fu training we would practice forms and one steps (different names in kung fu...but basically the same idea).

-Then, when it came time for sparring, it looked completely different. So all the forms and one steps didn't apply to how we sparred.

- Then we would practice "self defense"... isn't that what we were already doing???... The self defense didn't look like the forms or the one steps or the sparring.

To me, that's just a confused message. Is it fun to learn all that stuff, sure. But the lack of consistency makes it tough to get really good at all of it or to identify a theme.

[Nevinyrral]

Mostly when schools tell you that they teach one thing but when it gets to training its something diffrent.

Also when 'senseis' have no background in martial arts.

And 9yo blackbelts.

[AmericanKenpoKarate]

Some Ma school they do the mcdojo thig and they teach but they dont tell ya step by step[ and some instructors are rude

on the other hand my karate Studio Flores bros Kenpo karate studio is the best the instructors there teach ya step by step and by detai specially my sifu jesus hes the head Instructor he explained it good FBKKS 4 life

[ninjanurse]

Any school that puts money before their art...that pretty much covers it all!

[Hawkmoon]

Where to start!!

Well much of what grinds on me has been mentioned to be honest!

So to things that rate high on my 'dislike list'

Poor standards;

...thousands of years of honour, respect and tradition destroyed in under an hour!

Awesome well done ... have a house point!

Money machines;

... the for profit set-ups, sadly there are more with money interests than art interests. Places that treat kids like a production like and gradings are just a machine to run the profits!

(I accept some profit can be made, and be a good club as well)

Arrogance:

The ones where you walk in, beginner or graded, a sniff a quick look up and down and "...stand in the back rows see what you can pick up..." sorry did I miss something about student teacher relationship?

'Belt/Grade' hungry parents:

If its that easy join in and show us how its done and show us how amazing you are .... please!!

Exaggeration:

Movement, speech and so on ... jeez you came to a dojo (or should that be dojang) to learn martial arts, not how to walk from the door to the edge of the mat!

Walk already!

HOLLYWOOD and its depiction of MA !!!

...and relax!

soon be summer again!