Would you change?

[ralphmcpherson]

Exactly! And that is why the Kukkiwon has allowed themselves to become unimportant. They never check on who they are certifying or who is applying for certification. They have never made inspections to maintain quality. Their testing requirements are simply minimal at best for any program. On top of that they never revoke certification (yes I know its a big threat that everyone has herd that they do but have you ever known anyone that has actually had it dont to them?)
So the question of changing? No, I took my instructors curriculum and spent 30 years improving upon it and developing it further. Would I take a look at it to see if there was something I could steal (oops I mean borrow)? You bet, it would be ignorant of me not to. But changing over a program that I know is good to one just because someone in Korea wants me to? Not going to happen.

This is the problem Ive always seen. I have met too many very average tkdists/tkd schools who have kukkiwon certification. Not that Im taking anything away from the thousands and thousands of very competent schools and students who are also kukkiwon, but if someone doesnt weed out the "dodgy" ones then it undermines all the good ones. The certification I need for work I value heavily because they simply dont allow anyone average or below average to get one so the consumer knows if they use my business they will get the highest possible service and workmanship, if I dont deliver on that my certification is revoked. That is what makes my certification so valuable to both me and the consumer. If the kukkiwon doesnt police who gets these certs and checks that they are fulfilling their obligations within that certification then to me the certificate is nothing more than a fancy piece of cardboard.

 

[puunui]

Exactly! And that is why the Kukkiwon has allowed themselves to become unimportant.

Tell that to all the people doing all the crazy stuff to get Kukkiwon certification. It ain't unimportant to them.

On top of that they never revoke certification (yes I know its a big threat that everyone has herd that they do but have you ever known anyone that has actually had it dont to them?)

Actually I do. They got demoted and lost their promotion recommendation privileges.

 

[troubleenuf]

I would have to SEE proof of that... Its like one of those things that my cousin told to my friend who told my wife who saw the whole thing.

Actually I do. They got demoted and lost their promotion recommendation privileges.[/QUOTE]

 

[leadleg]

This is the problem Ive always seen. I have met too many very average tkdists/tkd schools who have kukkiwon certification. Not that Im taking anything away from the thousands and thousands of very competent schools and students who are also kukkiwon, but if someone doesnt weed out the "dodgy" ones then it undermines all the good ones. The certification I need for work I value heavily because they simply dont allow anyone average or below average to get one so the consumer knows if they use my business they will get the highest possible service and workmanship, if I dont deliver on that my certification is revoked. That is what makes my certification so valuable to both me and the consumer. If the kukkiwon doesnt police who gets these certs and checks that they are fulfilling their obligations within that certification then to me the certificate is nothing more than a fancy piece of cardboard.

Who regulates all the independents like your school? I would say more bad martial arts are done by indies than from org's,but that is my opinion.
Does this mean you feel this way about your certificate since only your instructors are checking on themselves? Just a piece of cardboard?

 

[ralphmcpherson]

Who regulates all the independents like your school? I would say more bad martial arts are done by indies than from org's,but that is my opinion.
Does this mean you feel this way about your certificate since only your instructors are checking on themselves? Just a piece of cardboard?

Our GM personally trains all his instructors and has appointed a chief instructor. The chief instructor regularly attends classes and sits at the back to check that the set curriculum is being taught, and taught the way its supposed to be. All instructors must attend black belt class where the curriculum is set out for them and they are taught how to teach it. Instructors are then assessed by the GM and chief instructor to check they are adhering to everything set out for them. Going by that, Id say we are a lot more regulated. But thats not the point, as Ive said many many times, I have no problem with the kukkiwon or the kukkiwon curriculum, in fact I think its great there is a governing body BUT, if they dont over see whats being taught and watch classes to see its being taught as instructed then I dont see the point. In my opinion (and its only my opinion), I dont see the point in regulating something unless you are going to stringently oversee everyone in the org to make sure that those not adhering dont undermine all the hardwork done by those that do.When I got my black belt cert I knew I had done everything to the letter as required by my GM and had followed the exact curriculum as every other black belt in the club. Unfortunately the same cannot be said for ALL kukkiwon black belts. I hope any proposed changes can rectify this. Please understand that I have nothing against the kukkiwon, one of my mate's is a kukkiwon black belt and he's damn good, and is an excellent product of the style. Dont be fooled by one poster on this board who has tried to paint me as anti kukkiwon, I have always been respectful towards the kukkiwon in my couple of years on martial talk. The only point I try to make is that its not consistent accross the board and surely the biggest advantage of an org is consistency.

 

[leadleg]

Our GM personally trains all his instructors and has appointed a chief instructor. The chief instructor regularly attends classes and sits at the back to check that the set curriculum is being taught, and taught the way its supposed to be. All instructors must attend black belt class where the curriculum is set out for them and they are taught how to teach it. Instructors are then assessed by the GM and chief instructor to check they are adhering to everything set out for them. Going by that, Id say we are a lot more regulated. But thats not the point, as Ive said many many times, I have no problem with the kukkiwon or the kukkiwon curriculum, in fact I think its great there is a governing body BUT, if they dont over see whats being taught and watch classes to see its being taught as instructed then I dont see the point. In my opinion (and its only my opinion), I dont see the point in regulating something unless you are going to stringently oversee everyone in the org to make sure that those not adhering dont undermine all the hardwork done by those that do.When I got my black belt cert I knew I had done everything to the letter as required by my GM and had followed the exact curriculum as every other black belt in the club. Unfortunately the same cannot be said for ALL kukkiwon black belts. I hope any proposed changes can rectify this. Please understand that I have nothing against the kukkiwon, one of my best mate's is a kukkiwon black belt and he's damn good, and is an excellent product of the style. The only point I try to make is that its not consistent accross the board and surely the biggest advantage of an org is consistency.

I am not accusing you of having anything against KKW I will say that many KKW schools have a GM who oversee's his instructors same as yours but since the KKW itself is not being big brother about it does that mean the cert is unworthy?`
You are doing KKW forms are your forms being monitered by KKW or does your GM just decide how they should be done and police himself,I don't get the differece here.
You say your school has thousands of students and you can say to me that every student in every school is the same quality? That would be dificult to believe,but I will if you are so sure.

 

[ralphmcpherson]

I am not accusing you of having anything against KKW I will say that many KKW schools have a GM who oversee's his instructors same as yours but since the KKW itself is not being big brother about it does that mean the cert is unworthy?`
You are doing KKW forms are your forms being monitered by KKW or does your GM just decide how they should be done and police himself,I don't get the differece here.
You say your school has thousands of students and you can say to me that every student in every school is the same quality? That would be dificult to believe,but I will if you are so sure.

No, I cannot say that every student in our school is equal, far from it. But I can say that every single one of the students has been taught the exact same curriculum and has had it taught the exaxct same way. They learn the same forms, the same self defence, the same grading requirements, the same number of gup grades, the same order of belts, the same terminologies, the same class lengths, the same rules, the same uniform, the same kicks and punches taught in the same order and the list goes on. I would think that all kukkiwon clubs should be the same also, otherwise I dont see the point in having a larger org overseeing things. I feel sorry for people who work their backside off at a good kukkiwon club and receive the same black belt certificate as the dodgy kukkiwon club up the road handing out black belts like there's no tomorrow. Surely if they both have the same piece of paper then they should have had to adhere to the same standards to get that piece of paper. I have friends who train at rhee tkd (many actually), and that club is huge, my club is tiny in comparison, yet they have been able to maintain the same standards exactly right accross this country because their org actually goes out of its way to make sure this is the case. I never meant to say a kukkiwon cert is not worthy, what I meant was that people base the importance of a kukkiwon certificate on the fact that it is widely accepted and they are part of a huge organisation, but if things can vary so greatly from one of their clubs to another then I think a lot of this importance gets diminished. People tell me that my cert is just a piece of paper because its only from an independent club but I take great pride in the fact that no one, anywhere has a cert signed by my GM who has not met the EXACT same standards I did and that is important to me.

 

[andyjeffries]

Actually I do. They got demoted and lost their promotion recommendation privileges.

While I can imagine you don't want to post names, could you give more details in fairly general terms. What rank were they, what rank were they demoted to, what did they do wrong?

It seems Kukkiwon demotion is very rare so I'm just trying to get a feel for what they did to cause it and how much of a drop the Kukkiwon imposed.

 

[troubleenuf]

If they actually did this, and I have yet to see proof they do, would they not have the form posted on the Kukkiwon website for demotion and or at least have rules and regulations for such demotion or removal of certification? Never seen it, and still dont believe they actually have done it.

While I can imagine you don't want to post names, could you give more details in fairly general terms. What rank were they, what rank were they demoted to, what did they do wrong?

It seems Kukkiwon demotion is very rare so I'm just trying to get a feel for what they did to cause it and how much of a drop the Kukkiwon imposed.

 

[andyjeffries]

If they actually did this, and I have yet to see proof they do, would they not have the form posted on the Kukkiwon website for demotion and or at least have rules and regulations for such demotion or removal of certification? Never seen it, and still dont believe they actually have done it.

I'm guessing, but I'd still say it's a very rare thing, that is likely to be just done by a discussion of the Dan Promotion Committee at the Kukkiwon. I can't imagine there would a form to fill out, it's likely to be obvious from evidence gathering (maybe newspaper articles, legal forms, lots of witness accounts, etc) and then discussed/actioned. As it would probably be taken on a case by case, there's unlikely to be the need for rules and regulations.

As I said though, I'm guessing, but that's how I'd envisage it being done.

Interested to see what those in the know say though...