If you were to create a new martial art, based on your experiences? How would you handle rankings? Would you do them at all, go with a belt system, a level system, or a tiered system(ie: only student/advanced student/instructor/master)?
What would be the best for your own 'style', and what do you think would do the best choice if you were trying to start a profitable school? Why?
I would 100% go with a rank system. One which has a lot of ranks early on and fewer as you level up more.
I know there are some people who say that rank isn't important, or that people should focus on skill over rank. But the vast majority of your students are going to want rank. It may not be the most important thing to them, but it will be up there. This is especially true for kids. In fact, one thing I think Kukkiwon TKD and IBJJF BJJ agree on is that kids need a lot of promotions or they'll lose motivation.
One thing my Master explained to me when I first started teaching is that white belts are white belts in attitude as well as technique. So even if rank matters less as you go up, having those early rewards for those that are still learning the culture is a good thing. You don't want to weed out 95% of your students just because they don't meet your vision of what a perfect martial artist should be.
I believe you know from the countless threads I've made on the subject that this is something I've been thinking strongly about. What I've got is a system where the beginner level is white and yellow belt, the intermediate level is green, green & white, blue, blue & white, the advanced level is purple, purple & white, purple & black, red, red & white, red & black, red & 2-black (technically black & red) and then black belt. There's a new form every belt and stripe, new kicks and grappling skills every color, and new striking and self-defense concepts every tier. It's a framework that I think will pace things well for students and be easy for instructors to keep track of. It also means the intermediate level is 2x as long as the beginner level, and the advanced level is ~2x long as the intermediate.
The other question is what to do with folks coming in from outside. I'm figuring out what I believe is the core of my art. I'm doing TKD, and I think people need to be capable of following along with the kicks and forms at their belt level. All of the other stuff is usually school-specific, and I expect 99% of the TKD schools aren't going to teach you the grappling skills that I have. So as long as you're not overwhelmed by the kicks and forms at that belt level, I'm fine with bringing people in at a relative keub level. (For example, if they were a purple belt, but purple is after yellow, then I'll put them at green).
