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Why Don't Aikido Schools

Why don't Aikido schools train with one another?

Many years ago when I was taking Isshinryu Karate a wondrous thing took place twice a month. Karateka from several different schools, styles, associations, and federations got together to train and share new techniques they had learned.

This lasted for about 4 or 5 hours. Participants would come from as far as south Portland, Oregon and as far north as Bellingham, Washington. This was a tremendous learning experience for all of us.

I have tried to understand why Aikido instructors refuse to participate, or allow their students to participate in training with other schools and instructors. We, at the WAD, encourage our students to go out and visit and train with other Aikido dojos in our area. I personally think it is important for our students to experience training under another instructor they might even discover that they are more inspired under someone else.

We feel, at the WAD, that we offer the best instruction for our local area but talk is cheap and more importantly one of our students might connect better with another instructor and that would be better for them. If I, or any of our instructors, do not inspire them to learn and strive to go beyond their current limits then they should train under another instructor that does.

Perhaps we look at things differently, we are not motivated by money or any thing else we only want what is best for our students.