I was introduced to this concept way back in the early 1970s. It came up because there just were not the number of practitioners and instructors there are today and it was a mechanism to get one of a group moved up to the next level.
For instance, a black belt might have a small group of people he or she has trained and then that instructor moves on. Job relocation, military service or even death. It leaves the group with no senior.
Typically there is one of the group who rises to the top. Often, efforts are made to find another teacher or a group that can promote. If that fails, and it does, the quorum is used. The group agrees that one of their number is moved up. A group of browns may elect one to go to black and it's based on a number of criteria. The major one is that that person is the most knowledgeable and likely the best practitioner. Attitude is considered as well as leadership.
What follows is an effort by the leader, with the help of the group, to find a source for more information and therefore progress. They find a teacher or association that fits their goals and needs. The person who was moved up may have to re-test or will be required to have their previous material refined with the goal of moving them and their people forward with future testing.
Is this difficult? Yes. Egos, money, time, distance, stylistic differences and more enter into the picture. Is it worth it? Yes, if the right choices are made.
The downside is that the group possibly connects with a teacher or association that really just wants their numbers and membership dues. Or that the group is really looking for easy rank and recognition.
The quorum almost isn't needed anymore because there are so many more people doing martial arts and qualified instructors are not so few and far between. When I entered the Parker system the nearest qualified IKKA instructor was Joe Palanzo in Baltimore, about 1,000 miles from where I lived in Chicago. Yet many people took the high road and sought out and went to train with these qualified people that were hundreds or thousands of miles away. Alternately, they brought those instructors in to their city for a weekend. It cost a lot in time, effort, money, and more. But it paid off and today there are more well-trained, knowledgeable people teaching.
What we see today is frequent promotions without a senior overseeing the promotion and no attempt at a quorum. Promotions come from students or association members. There's really no excuse for that with the aforementioned access to qualified seniors. There are reasons but no excuses. The reasons are that those taking the ranks don't really want to have to go through the hoops. It's easier to start your own group or just put the rank on.
If you look at the US today and plot on a map where the seniors are you can see the distances are just not that great that it can't be done.
Northwest - John Sepulveda (has people in through Colorado, Washington, Georgia, S. Carolina, New York, Massachusetts)
West Coast - Steve LaBounty and Graham Lelliott (Central California)
Bob White, Ron Chapel, Frank Trejo - SoCal
SW - Dennis Conatser (AZ)
Mid-south Brian Duffy (TX) has people in OK, TX and even South America
South - Huk Planas, (Louisiana)
Midwest - Kurt Barnhart (Chicago)
Joe Palanzo - Mid-Atlantic
NE - Steve White (New Hampshire)
All these instructors and I have people all over the country and we're easy to access. And we're not the only ones. And I know there are people scattered here and there and they travel to get training. With the plethora of camps and events it's not hard to meet people from the major groups and see what it takes to become a part of them.
Where it gets sticky is telling who is for real and who is not. The internet helps and you should be sending e-mail inquiries and making phone calls, just like if you were signing up for class in the first place. There is no way around this that to get somewhere and train. It's going to take a lot and it's going to take time. Humans like to do things the easy way and just bagging all that and putting the rank on yourself is that easy way. You want the knowledge, it's not easy or cheap. Like Mr. Parker said, "If you gotta pull teeth to get it, it means more to you."
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