Happy Birthday!

July 2 – Ben
July 4 – Guaire
July 8 – Kara
July 17 – Kristian
July 24 – Jaden
July 27 – Tyler

No class Monday, July 5

In observance of July 4th holidays, there are no scheduled classes for Monday.  If you would still like to practice, please go ahead and use the lockbox or talk to a senior student who knows the lockbox code.

Next promotion test

Our next test is scheduled for Thursday July 22 at 6pm.  Please come and support Priscilla McCabe, John Buck, and Kristian Frye as they test for their 1st Dan black belt. In addition, we will have a few of the juniors testing for their green stripes including Alex, Jaden, Guaire, Jake and Addison. We are very pleased to have 4th dan Master James Kelley coming up to certify the test on behalf of Taekwon-Do International.  Master Kelley and I have known each other for 12 years.  To learn a little about Master Kelley, I encourage you to read his 4th dan essay and watch his demonstration video.

From the looks of things, we will probably need to have a promotion test in August as many students are on the borderline in terms of having enough classes.  I would expect this to be in the last week of August.

Welcome new students

Congratulations to Ben, Kara, Lori, Erika, Devin, Aidan, Dylan, Jack, and Nick. Our 9 new students have shown tremendous commitment and made significant progress. Those first few classes are very awkward and challenging and a large percentage of people quit before their 5th class. We are very proud of you for your commitment and hard work and hope Taekwon-Do remains a valuable part of your life for many years to come.

No new students until September

Oneonta Taekwon-Do will not be actively soliciting new students until September in order to give maximum attention to all of our existing students. In particular, our new blackbelts will require continued classes to help them transition into the role of teacher.
Given our space restrictions and an inability to offer more classes at this time, I want to focus on supporting and developing all of our existing students for a couple of months before seeking out new students. Obviously, if someone walks in, we won’t turn them away. However, we will most likely begin a waiting list for September.

T-Shirts have arrived

Please bring a check or cash for $15 for a T-Shirt next time you come to school.  We ordered white t-shirts in adult sizes S-XL and they look terrific!

Summer camp

Grandmaster Kim is hosting his annual summer camp the weekend of August 27th in southern New Jersey. The camps are a very unique opportunity to learn new techniques and master old ones from Masters and Grandmasters. Among the expected instructors will be Master Marr (6th dan), Master Yang (4th Dan), Master Meany (6th Dan), Grandmaster Donnelly (8th Dan), Master Nathanson (6th Dan) and of course Grandmaster Kim (9th Dan). Perhaps the best part of the camp is having the opportunity to get away from the daily grind, the housework, the job, the computers, and simply be a camper, with a book, and having all (fairly healthy) meals prepared for you. The camp features swimming pools, courts, and rec rooms for you to enjoy in between the training sessions. I think you’ll find that you learn a tremendous amount during the weekend; lessons that will stay with you a lifetime.
I will be renting a van to drive everyone down and back (it’s a 4 hour drive). We will leave early Friday morning and return at approximately 4pm on Sunday. A signup sheet will be available next week. Please indicate if you are a yes, no, or maybe so that I can schedule an appropriate vehicle. All students age 9 and older are urged to attend. You can download a copy of the SJKim Summer Camp flyer here.

The 4th school rule

Thank you very much to the students who remember to vacuum the dojang every day and mop it on Thursday night. Emptying the garbages, replacing the toilet paper and paper towel rolls are greatly appreciated. Vacuuming the hallways, changing rooms, offices, and entryway all contribute to giving the school a nicer appearance. If you haven’t taken a turn, please ask a black belt or senior student how you can help.

Oneonta Taekwon-Do sent two representatives to Grandmaster Kim’s April Championship in New York City. This is the first time anyone from our school has gone to compete. Both students returned with trophies. We are very proud of Mr. McCabe and Finn. We greatly appreciate their commitment and the time dedicated by Finn’s dad, Richard for making the drive.

What follows is Finn’s summary of the day.  Please be sure to congratulate Finn and Owen on their accomplishments!

On April 24, a sunny Saturday morning, I took a trip with my father and my cousin Owen, a blackbelt, down to Manhattan in order to attend Grandmaster Kim’s Interschool Taekwondo competition. After our long, multiple hour drive, and after finding adequate parking, we arrived at Master Kim’s to find the place packed almost shoulder to shoulder with young students and their parents.

The kids picked out their breaking boards, and then we all sat for Master Kim’s speech. The day’s events started with the junior demonstration team, doing board breaks and multiple participant patterns. At one point, they even did Choong-Moo with 6 people standing in a circle. Next on the list was the junior competition, starting with board breaks, then patterns, and then free fighting. I recall one small girl whose favourite kick was a counter-attacking back kick. She looked like a mini tornado!

After the kid’s competition, it was time for the adults to begin. The competition started again with board breaks, in which I broke two boards with a left back kick, two boards with a right back kick, and a board with a punch. I earned second place. After that was the pattern section of the tournament. I performed Do-San, after a gentleman recommended that I perform the pattern that I most recently passed a test for, as apposed to performing a pattern that I had recently begun practicing. I won second place in this, as well.

At last came the free-fighting. I fought a yellow belt with a green stripe, the only opponent in my belt range and weight class. After two rounds, we were tied two for two. The judges decided it was time for sudden death. Taking a note from a blackbelt interim test I once saw, I decided to strike quickly, immediately after the sparring high-five with a left punch to the center of the pad. One of the judges decided that this was bad sportsmanship, and decided to deduct one point from my score, effectively killing my chances of winning. After speaking with Grandmaster Kim, the judges decided to simply start sudden death over again. I struck quickly, with one or two combinations, finally sticking a front turning kick to the chestguard of my opponent. I won first place in sparring.

Owen had won a first place trophy in sparring and a second place trophy in board breaking. Finally, after a long day, we decided it was time to go home. I suppose I’ll leave out the boring part of the story about the terrible restaurant and nearly running out of gas in Worcester.

Snuggle in, it’s a long one…..

Competition classes

Thank you to all students who participated in the competition classes. This was the first time we offered classes geared toward the sparring and competition aspect of Taekwon-Do. It was fun to give everyone the chance to take a break from patterns awhile and hit each other.

New students

In November, we welcomed several new students including Anthony, Dr. Mark, Aaron, and Finn. We are also pleased to welcome back Sky Monosson who was temporarily out due to an injury. As such, classes have become a bit more crowded. Thank you for your patience and consideration.

The Mirror Fund

The Mirror fund finally reached its goal of $350 and we are ready to purchase mirrors. However, mirrors are not easily moved and we anticipate moving to our new home in January or February so I decided to go ahead and purchase a free-standing heavy bag I found second-hand at a deep discount. We will surely have enough funds to install mirrors when we move into our new space.

Gift certificates online

Our website features the ability to purchase gift certificates good for bellydancing or Taekwon-do. Why not give a friend or loved one the gift of a good workout for the mind, body, and spirit?

Gift ideas

For that Taekwon-Do practitioner in the family, I’ve compiled a list of recommended gift ideas. For those who don’t know, the website receives over 3000 visitors per week from around the world. When people click on a link to another website, we earn a small percentage although it doesn’t change the purchase price at all. It is my intention that income from the website be used to help keep tuition prices as low as possible!

The new space

To those who haven’t heard, we are finalizing an agreement to move into the former McLaughlin’s in the Clinton Plaza on Main Street across the street from Salvation Army. “Oneonta Mind Body Spirit” will offer complementary and integrated health services including chiropractic, acupuncture, massage, reiki, reconnective healing, and numerous other forms of health and wellness services. By partnering with several practitioners in the area, we expect to strengthen by way of shared services and cross promotion. The space is over 4,000 square feet of which 1200 will be dedicated to studio space for Taekwon-Do, Bellydancing, yoga dancing, Tai-Chi, Qi-Gong, and any other practitioner we can corral. As you can imagine, there is a great deal of paperwork and planning to pull off such an effort and an opening date is not predictable at this point. Stay tuned.

Bellydancing renews for winter sessions

Caroline Huxtable has decided to offer more bellydancing sessions beginning in January. All women are welcome and encouraged to take classes. Please email Caroline at upstatebellydance@yahoo.com for more info. Better yet, come see the troupe perform on Saturday, December 12th at My Father’s Place in the east end of Oneonta (Rainbow Inn).

December promotion test and celebration

The December promotion test will be held on Thursday, December 17 at 6pm sharp. There will be no classes and students are encouraged to arrive early for stretching. Please join us to celebrate afterwards. Not only are we celebrating the test, and the holidays, but we are celebrating 5 years of Oneonta Taekwon-Do. In December of 2004, Brian Davis responded to an ad in the paper I placed and we began training 3-4 days per week in a vacant living room. This lead to several months in Laurens, followed by a few months here and there before we landed at 12 S. Main St in 2007.

Mr. Davis will be doing an interim test and it is sure to be a fun occasion. Please remember to submit your test forms as soon as possible and drop off a check or cash prior to the day of the test.

Children’s classes

At this time, we anticipate offering classes for children aged 6-10 beginning in the middle of January. Theo Carbone has signed up for an internship program with Hartwick College where he will be involved in organizing the sales, marketing, and logistics for the launch. A training program has been established and more will be written in the near future. Classes will be offered twice a week at 4:00pm. Eventually, our new space will permit simultaneous adult and children classes with a separator partition.
Unlike adult classes, the children’s classes will run in sessions to control the chaos of introductory lessons. We will only take 10 children to start and allow 5-10 new children per month.

Christmas closings

Please mark your calendars. School will be closed on 12/24, 25, 26, 31 and January 1. As a reminder, school closings are displayed on our website at http://oneontatkd.com/wordpress/

Emergency closings

Last year, we had 2 or 3 occasions where no instructor could make it to class. Since we cannot call everyone, we will send out email upon a sudden cancellation as well as a text message. Please subscribe to our emergency-only text message system. You can always call my cell phone at 607-437-7866 if you are unsure about classes being cancelled.

Patterns online

Some of you may know that I have been working on building the Taekwon-Do International website for the past few months in my spare spare spare spare time. This week, I released the patterns encyclopedia at http://patterns.tkdunion.org Thanks to some help by John Buck, we have managed to build a database of patterns, stances, techniques and videos. Much more will be added in time. Please bookmark the site and refer to it often as it will be our best source of pattern information. To learn why I think it will be the BEST Taekwon-Do encyclopedia online, watch this video.

Thank you all, I look forward to seeing you in class again soon.

Congratulations to Matt Goodrich on successfully earning his 1st degree black belt. Matt is now certified by Taekwon-Do International to be a black belt in good standing.

For his promotion test, Matt traveled to NYC with his family and fellow Oneonta Taekwon-Do schoolmate John Buck. He completed a written exam, an endurance test, and then gave a demonstration including 3 patterns, basic combinations, sparring, and 3 different board breaks.

In addition to the physical requirements, Taekwon-Do International requires proven examples of living up to the Tenets of Taekwon-Do.

Congratulations to Matt on this significant milestone. Please enjoy the video highlights below and offer Matt your congratulations next time you see him.

In this Newsletter:

Free month special,  Next promotion test/Demonstration, Space needed, Black belt classes

Free month special now through September 30th

For the remainder of the month, we are offering a month free to new students when they sign up for a 3 month tuition package which includes a free uniform and two private lessons. If you have contacted us recently about classes, now is the time to join. Due to space restrictions, we can only extend this offer to the next 4 students so contact us today!

Promotion and demonstration Thursday September 24th, 6PM

Please come support our students including Owen McCabe who will be testing for his 1st Dan. Test begins at 6pm sharp. All students are reminded to submit test forms and fees prior to the date of the test. Students and their families are invited to a special dinner celebration afterward. Appropriate attire is requested as we celebrate the recent black belt promotions and birthdays.

Still looking for space

The Mannions are still looking for a different location and seeking 4000-7000 square feet or a vacant lot. Their intention is to offer alternative health services coupled with physical training classes in a central location for a complete support of Mind, Body, and Spiritual health. If you know building owners with upcoming vacancies or an interest to sell, please have them contact the school. Specifically, locations between Price Chopper and Oneida Street are of interest but Downtown Oneonta is preferred.

Black belt classes beginning in October

In order to more fully train our black belts, it is time to add a black belt class to the schedule. Traditionally, this is scheduled at the end of the week, as the last class of the week. At this time, we anticipate that black belt class will be Thursday nights from 7:20 until 7:50pm with the expectation that black belts will attend the 6:30pm regular class as a “warmup”.

Mr. Mannion appointed

The executive committee of Taekwon-do International has appointed Mr. Mannion as the Director of Communications. His first role in this capacity is to launch a new website to reflect the organization as the world class institution it is. The new website will feature forums, a wiki, online store, news releases, video archives, and a social component akin to Facebook where members can have blogs, home pages, and post messages, videos, and pictures. The website will be translated into over 41 languages and provide the leading source of new memberships. John Buck has been hired as an independent contractor to assist with the site’s launch and development. The site has a targeted completion date of 11/1/09 but is currently “live” at http://tkdunion.com

Grandmaster Konrad Spillman is vice-president of Taekwon-do International. His school website contains a very lengthy page concerning school etiquette.

I’ve hesitated offering this information for the simple reason that student/teacher etiquette is something that should be learned from the example of the teacher and senior students.

While I consider our senior students to be exemplary role models, we are not quite so fortunate as to be surrounded by the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th degree black belts in New York City who have been under the leadership of Grandmaster Kim for many years.

I’m encouraging our students to please read this lengthy list and take away from it what you feel is important and relevant. Much of the information revolves around basic humility, consideration of others before self, and self-control.

Please remember that as your rank increases, so too does the expectation of your behavior both in and out of class.

Sincerely,
Raymond Mannion 2nd Dan

Summer camp is one of the most enjoyable experiences you can have in your Taekwon-do training. Being surrounded by senior black belts and fellow students from other schools makes you realize the unique spirit that is SJ Kim.

Please click on this link for the sjkim-summercamp-2008.

Please click on this link for the sjkim-camp-application.

Note that scholarship essays are due before the end of the month.  Family members receive a 20 percent discount.  Non-Taekwon-do practitioner family are invited to attend for $150.  See the Camp Pontiac website for more info on the amenities.

Please call me if you have any questions.