ON LINE CLASSES

Hello students, guardians and parents.

I trust that you are all well and adjusting to our new “normal”. Since the closure in March we have been working hard with the landlord and government programs to make sure that the dojo space was maintained and would be ready for you when we could open for live classes. With the end of government support programs, we are now expected to resume paying full rent and utilities for the space. We considered re-opening when the province moved to phase 3 but with the risks involved to staff and students along with liability issues it wasn’t the right time yet. In conversation with many of you at that time, we determined that only about 50% of the students or less would return even if we did open for live classes. That isn’t enough to support expenses. I resisted going on line at first because we lose something when we’re not face to face and honestly, I thought we would be out of this by now, but it’s clear that this situation is going to be with us for a while longer so it’s time to rethink that.

I am now asking for your support in the defence of our club. Without support for our on line format there may be no dojo to return to in the future. In speaking with some of the students the message that I’m getting is that they are not interested in online classes and will just wait until live classes resume. I need to tell you now that If we can’t generate enough support to maintain the physical dojo space then we will have to give that up. I will still be able to offer on line classes from home and find a new space when the time is right. However, if there is not enough interest then I will have no choice but to give up teaching entirely. That may mean that there will be no future dojo to return to. We have a great dojo family. In some cases, three generations of people training over 30 years. It would be a huge loss both to me and to the committed students to give that up. Your health is of primary importance right now. Time to take responsibility for it.

Please! Consider the online classes and help save what we have built so we can again open live in the future.

If you are willing to try the online format, please go to the website and fill out the online membership form. Return it to waterloomartialarts@rogers.com. If you can’t fill it out on line, print it off, fill it out and take a picture of it to email it back. We are planning on starting classes for adult Karate September 28. Children’s classes will begin shortly after and we will add additional classes as they are needed. I know that some of you have already committed to the online classes but you also need to fill out the membership form and submit it. As a side note, we are also in the process of constructing an online video library. It will include warm ups, exercises, basics, kata, and application information relevant to each belt level and age. The library will be accessible as an add on to your monthly membership to supplement your online training. It will be a great resource for everyone, particularly for parents looking for ways to help the children with their training.

This is a fight we can’t afford to lose, so please show your true martial spirit and support us for the future of Goju Ryu and Yoku Ido.

Thank you.