[Uojeyak]

Does anyone have any information about a college league being formed? Sort of like the NCAA in the U.S.?

It would really do a lot for Kendo if we could make it happen.

What do you think?

[EspnaConCam]

My first impression is that it sounds awesome and makes me want to go back to college; my second is that there probably aren't enough colleges in a geographical region to make it practical.

[hablyShappY]

Yes and no, there are student tournaments and things like the harvard taikai. That is probably as close as you will come. You could look at adding a college division to the AUSKF taikai, however I think they have been doing cutting of divisions lately (wasnt it jr. girls teams?) And any college tournament would likely be dominated by international student ringers, where you average college kendoka has never heard of kendo before joining their college club. there are quite a few clubs around however, just in Michigan you have State, UM, eastern and central, add indiana with purdue and UIUC and UI had a dojo, not sure if they went under or what. Ohio has another 3-4 (does the classical kendo federation group count?) and then UW in madison......

[Erunsenef]

I'm president of the Penn State kendo club, and I think this sounds like an awesome idea. I know there are a good amount of colleges with kendo clubs in our travel distance. Tournaments are far too rare around here, and last year we missed the Cornell college tournament because the SEUSKF tournament was on the same weekend.

[dubballey]

The only problem I see with forming a college kendo league is the fact that most college kendo clubs aren't as stable as say football or basketball, or even karate and TKD for example. It's difficult to maintain a steady membership especially since kendo is not nearly as widespread or as well known as other martial arts. There are heavy concentrations of college clubs on the east and west coasts but not as many in between, making it difficult to justify forming a college specific league. Maybe in the future when kendo eventually becomes more prevalent it would be feasible but in the short term, perhaps it would be better to encourage holding more tournaments for college students.

[Irrampbroow]

The only problem I see with forming a college kendo league is the fact that most college kendo clubs aren't as stable as say football or basketball, or even karate and TKD for example.

Agree with this, stability is a problem, unless there is someone permanate to maintain the club (think faculty/staff) the chances of it going under go up exponentially.

There are heavy concentrations of college clubs on the east and west coasts but not as many in between,

disagree, there are more than you think likely, see my post above, we certainly have a good enough showing in the big 10 to have a big 10 tournament. and in the midwest (geographical region not the federation) there are at least 10, and most major universities have a club, pick a big city with a university and I will bet you it has, or had a club(looks like UI folded when the sandan left).

[meteeratymn]

disagree, there are more than you think likely, see my post above, we certainly have a good enough showing in the big 10 to have a big 10 tournament. and in the midwest (geographical region not the federation) there are at least 10, and most major universities have a club, pick a big city with a university and I will bet you it has, or had a club(looks like UI folded when the sandan left).

Sorry for the confusion, I didn't not mean to imply that at all. What I meant was that clubs in the east and west coasts have more college clubs within a smaller distance compared to those in the midwest, making it easier for them to form and attend college specific tournaments. With this in mind, it boils down to the issue of travel distance and costs. For clubs that have more that are closer, the cost and ability to attend college specific tournaments is much lower than those that have fewer within that same distance. For example, the nearest other college club to my old one (Carleton College) was U Wisconsin Madison, a 4.5 hour drive, and the next closest would be U Chicago, a 7 hour drive. By contrast, there are more within that same driving time in the New York area. Bottom line is that it depends on how far clubs would be willing to travel for tournaments and how many clubs are within the maximum driving distance they are willing to travel.

[orbidewa]

It sounds nice but you have to look at college kendo how it is now. This is my opinion from starting kendo in college at a club as a freshmen graduating in 2004 and still actively practicing kendo. On the east coast 90% (estimate) of the members start in college. So you can see from the Harvard Tournament's results maybe 2004 and up the West Coast College Club teams have dominated 1st and 2nd Place. Most of their members have started kendo at an earlier age and already belong to other dojos. There are other college tournaments besides Cornell and Harvard which are the biggest. Scheduling, traveling and hosting a tournament is not easy for most college clubs. Plus the purpose of kendo is not to win tournaments and some clubs automatically stress more importance to getting people ready to compete rather than basics. So often a person's kendo career ends after the graduate from college or sooner.

What I would like to see for college kendo in the U.S. and the AUSKF did at least look at the idea. Was making some type of Student Kendo Federation not for the purpose of competition. But making it easier for college students to join the AUSKF so they can test. Maybe even have a yearly seminar lead by a guest sensei or cultural exchanges with Japanese college clubs. In the long run personally I would like to see people continuing kendo long after they graduate. Instead of maybe doing kendo 1 to 4 years so they can go to college tournaments and win metals. But the college students have to actually want this and work at it. Maybe in the future then the Student Kendo Federation can have some tournaments but nothing like the NCAA level with recruitment violations and other problems.

[Feelundseenna]

The big reason that I like the idea is because it would give schools some incentive to have tournaments. Our club needs to go to tournaments, because that's how you get the school to see that you're actually doing something. Our club really didn't do anything at all last year (I was not a member yet since I went to a different campus), and we only got about $750 in allocation because of it. Now that's a good amount of money and I completely understand, but realistically that's just 2 sets of possible club bogu, or a few trips. We decided to use it on trips instead of bogu, and because of it I have to tell college students "spend $350 on bogu or quit" when they're ready, which upsets me a little bit because my Sensei was generous enough to allow me to borrow bogu until I was able to buy it myself.

This year I'm trying to get us out to more tournaments to at least get the club's name out there since we're still very new, but there just aren't any. So far we've gone to a shinsa, the SEUSKF tournament and the Rutgers University tournament. I would have loved to get to more then one tournament last semester, but it just wasn't a possibility.

Also, about west coast schools dominating our tournaments, maybe we would do better if we had more tournament experience?

[Teligacio]

while competing in tournaments are not necessarily important, I do think traveling is, even if you guys goto a tournament to volunteer a runners, you at least get exposure to kendo outside your dojo. As for the dominance, its the international student ringers I spoke of... I count nisei/sansei that started kendo at the age of 6 in that category. More tournament experience wont help you beat someone with a decade of kendo experience on you. For tournaments you just have to suck it up and go. The Wisconsin guys are an inspiration, they goto everything (they have a big university van they get to use so that helps) and most things are at minimum 10 hour drives for them, but there they are, every chicago, detroit, cleveland etc tournament. They come to the summer camp in lansing, goto this that. You just need to develop the culture of just doing it. Having a car helps certainly, I did collegiate sailing for a semester as well, and it was the same way, drive to florida, west coast, east cost, staying in cheap roach motels. you just do it, and enjoy it. You have the luxuries of being close enough to the east cost that lots of things should be within close driving distance.

[Numbiydq]

Being on the East Coast doesn't necessarily mean we are "closer to everything". I went to GW (Washington D.C.) and Cornell is about a 6 hour drive. Harvard is about an 8 hour drive and if you ask anybody from VA Tech or further south on the east coast they might be close to William and Mary but that is about it. Plus not everyone is lucky enough to get a van from the school so multiple cars are usually the method of travel. If you want to travel although you might get some value from going to a tournament. Travel to a local dojo visit other local clubs and practice with local people more. If your lucky to have a local club with experienced people you will get more value out of practicing with them maybe 2 to 3 times a month or more than going to every tournament you can to compete. There is no replacement for practice in the club/dojo and going to a couple more tournaments when West Coast players have 3 to 4 local tournaments a month in driving distance won't help much.

Hear is the truth about schools is that they care about money and their students but mostly money. Most likely the kendo club is not providing them a big enough cash flow. If you are able to host a well known annual tournament like Cornell or Harvard that has had a great track record for more than 10 years and the number of attendees increases almost every year. Maybe the school will support you with space and funding for that event because it adds to their prestige. Going to tournaments yeah it helps when you are submitting your budget to the student association but more tournaments doesn't necesarrily equal more dollars you will recieve. An example is when I was in college the Anime club got more money than the kendo club. The anime club watches anime and they really don't do much else other than maybe go to anime conventions. This happens because the anime club is smart enough to have a person always submit their budget on time every year and the club might get priority being an older club. Also it doesn't hurt to have friends that are members of the student association who approve the budget or members that are also officers of the student association. It has been talked about before in the forum but there are other ways of making money like ushering sporting events. Most likely you can easily make more than the budget your receive if you can get enough people.

[orbidewa]

Thank you all for your replies.

There are some very good points here.

Driving distance and money seem to be the deciding factors, however.

How would we go about getting the funding that we need for a startup? Make no mistake, this would be a business just like football is a business. So it is merely a matter of getting people interested in making an investment that could pay off in the long run, and could be very costly in the short term. This is something that has been in the back of my mind for a while now.

How risky do we think it would be?

How much do you think it would take to get it started and what would be the most important things to spend it on in the beginning?

What sorts of rules for the league would have to be in place that aren't already written in the AUSKF and so on?

How would we organize the teams? East vs. West with a championship game? Federation teams?

How would we advertise for the greatest effect? How do we make the money that we initially invest back?

A very important question would be....where do we get the money? Who or what do we ask?

Finally, who would be the movers and shakers in the kendo community that we would need to head such a project? The choice of leader is a vastly important one and cannot be overstated. Empires are built on the dreams of one man.

Just food for thought. Good contributions, everyone.

[UrUROFlS]

Well maybe we should form one. Me not being as able to travel as I used to be, I'd think about organizing his around the 'traditional' conferences that already exist e.g. in the Big 10 six out of the 11 schools (wait why do we still call it big 10?) have kendo.
(UIUC, Michigan, MSU, OSU, Purdue, U-Wisc). That's enough to think about a big 10 tournament open only to big ten dojos. A small tournament but one way to keep the west coast barbarians at bay.

Then what is now the Shoryuhai tournament (open to all colleges) could evolve into the national collegiate kendo championships.

[giDdfezP]

Sounds like an American discussion going on, but just to throw in my two pence, we've got the universities championship once a year here in Britain. (was in the winning team myself once! *cough*) Normally it's held on a Saturday, but this year it's being extended to a weekend (incl. both team and individuals competition) up in Edinburgh. (rotates to a different city every year) A league would theoretically be even more exciting, but as your brainstorming have pointed out the participants, transporation, costs, etc. do pose a big barrier. So I think rfoxmich's idea sounds like the best solution, afterall ours is the 13th year running now! I'm sure university kendokas wouldn't mind travelling once a year to gather and compete ... it's something to look forward to infact, well ... in my opinion anyways

[Sawyer]

Me not being as able to travel as I used to be,

True, but not all of us are that old, back in your heyday (cough when dinosaurs cough) you and the other 'tagawa boys' as i've heard it referenced, traveled all over the place.

[Kilaoksrsa]

jhawz no offense but I think the U.S. college kendo scene doesn't need the doesn't need the CKL (College Kendo League) or some organization who has the sole purpose of hosting a college championships. If the AUSKF in the future want to expand Junior Nationals to include a College Undergraduate division then I think more people would be in more favor of that. I'm saying Junior Nationals because it would be an annual event and Nationals is every 3 years. But goodluck to you if you choose to pursue it but I think you would have better luck creating a Fantasy Kendo League.

[Brareevor]

That's another possibility. Changing the junior nationals to include a college division. It would be easier than trying to start an entirely new business, but would it have the affect that I'm going for?

What I'm trying to do is come up with a way to expand Kendo across the U.S. To make Kendo a household name. I can't think of a better way than getting college people involved on a personal level. I would love to start with elementary schools or highschools, but I don't think it's as feasible a concept as college because of money. Colleges in general have more money than other types of schools. I know there are already some high schools in the U.S. that have Kendo clubs, but I want it to be more widespread.

I'd like to see a modern movie involving Kendo as a main theme, or perhaps some commercials for the practice of Kendo on cable tv.

I think a College Kendo League would be just the thing to help get word about Kendo out to the masses. If college people get into Kendo and love it, they will stick with it. They will take it home to their families and tell them about it. They'll look for a dojo nearby where they could train after college. It would lead to more dojos, and fresh recruits.

It could work just like the college football industry. Except Kendo teams will have cooler team names.

Thoughts?

[Poothevokprot]

there is already a US national kendo league... its called the AUSKF, there is nothing an additional college kendo organization could do on a national level that you wouldn't already see there. I dont think you understand how funding colleges work if you think they have money laying around, most are hard pressed to provide paper to print syllabus on these days. There are modern movies with kendo as a main theme, fourth dan comes to mind in English, and if you learn to speak Japanese there is a whole bunch more. A tv commercial only costs money. As for college people getting into kendo and loving it, sorry not going to happen. See other posts re droupout rates. I've posted this example before but at MSU Ron teaches a kendo class, which exposes between 35-50 new college students to kendo every single semester... thats close to 100 per year, guess how many fall in love with kendo, and keep going on with it? And remeber these are students that elected and paid money to take an introduction to kendo class.....

[ITYfl01c]

That's another possibility. Changing the junior nationals to include a college division. It would be easier than trying to start an entirely new business, but would it have the affect that I'm going for?

What I'm trying to do is come up with a way to expand Kendo across the U.S. To make Kendo a household name. I can't think of a better way than getting college people involved on a personal level.

In my opinion, training well with other college students so that they remember their collegiate kendo experience positively for the rest of their lives will get them involved on a more meaningful and personal level than some sort of commercialized, alcohol sponsored, hyper-valued system of artificial rivalry.

http://www.phdcomics.com/comics/arch...p?comicid=1086

[ThisIsOK]

Thanks ender84567 for your response because what your saying is 100% right. Jhawz I see you started kendo in September 2009 so you have alot of enthusiasm but I think the CKL is not needed and too ambitious a project. Then when you started mentioning movies and other creative marketing you totally lost me. Not even the Korean Kumdo Association is going to the links to promote kumdo to the mainstream and your ideas are big most of them have been done already. I think part of the draw for kendo is not everyone practice kendo. Yes I would love to see kendo grow but I won't want it to suffer like when Judo was put in the Olympics. But that is entirely different discussion and you can search the threads. Again if there was some organization for College Kendo it should work with the AUSKF to provide opportunities for college kendoka test for ranks, maybe an annual seminar on basics with a guest Sensei, frienship practices with Japanese college clubs visiting the U.S. and maybe help providing experienced shimpan for big college tournaments. In the long run I think this will help hopefully encourage most college kendoka to still practice after they graduate.