From: mikel@Apple.COM (Mikel Evins)
Newsgroups: rec.martial-arts
Subject: Re: Badass Karate (-Do?)
Date: 10 Nov 92 19:52:10 GMT
Organization: Apple Computer Inc., Cupertino, CA

In article <25507@sybase.sybase.com> thorick@sybase.com (Thorick Chow) writes:
>I've sometimes wondered why he didn't try full-time teaching of MA
>for a living.  One thing that comes to mind is that by NOT depending
>on it for a living, he could do and teach exactly as he saw fit
>without worrying about getting or retaining the number of students
>necessary to make a living at it (though I think he usually had
>enough students that he could have gotten by)..   i.e. he didn't
>have to 'sell out' or commercialize (read 'cheapen' to the purist)...

There are bad people both in and out of commercial schools,
and there are good people both in and out of commercial schools.

One can argue that, if a person is teaching without a fee,
or is not running a commercial school, that he or she must
be teaching from noble motives, but that is a specious
argument. After all, greed is not the only ignoble motivation
that people might have for doing something.

There is always the risk that a person who opens a commercial
school is more motivated by monetary gain than by love for
a martial art. On the other hand, I can tell you from experience
that opening a martial arts school is not a fast road to
easy money. It's like any other small business: it's a 
more than full-time job that replaces most of your social
life and hobbies with mundane concerns that go home with
you every night. If you want to do it then you had better
love martial arts or you are kidding yourself.

Now some commercial schools use very predatory business
practices, like abusive contracts, intimidation tactics in
classes, variations on bait-and-switch to get parents
of students to pay lots of money. The philosophy of
business that I learned from my instructors is that, in the
long run, those tactics don't pay off. They tell me that
there are just a handful of schools in Denver that were
there when they started 12 years ago; fewer than the fingers on
one hand. On the other hand, dozens of big commercial
schools have gone out of business over the years. Why?
David Soard says he thinks it's because, after 3-5 years
of predatory relationships with customers, these schools
have alienated their students and prospective students,
and nobody wants to study with them anymore. If they
want to continue to make money then they have to move to
another city where people don't know them.

A good teacher might teach a small group, or might teach
for free, because of a feeling that the commercial
schools don't have the right atmosphere, or because
he or she doesn't care for the demands of running a 
small business. On the other hand, a different good
teacher might prefer the structure that a commercial
school imposes; might appreciate the responsibility
to show up every day, rain or shine, might flourish
in the atmosphere of a facility devoted entirely to
study and practice of his or her chosen art.

At the same time, a bad teacher might open a school on a
shoestring hoping to bilk unwary consumers before
folding up and disappearing; or might hope to buiild
some sort of empire out of ignorance of how small
businesses depend on the good will of their clientele.
On the other hand, it's equally possible that a
bad teacher could decide to teach privately to minimize
the chances of being caught out in impropriety, or
because he or she doesn't have the wherewithal to 
manage a small business, or because he or she wants
to attract a small circle of sycophants to feed his
or her ego.

In short, I don't think you can tell whether a given
individual is any good as a person or a teacher just
from knowing whether he or she teaches in a commercial
school. I think you have to find out about the individual,
and use your best judgement to decide on an individual
basis.