2007 - New Association is created
Sensei announces the New Organization: Read email here.
In late 2006 Onaga sensei requested that a group of senior students put together the framework for building and managing what was slowly becoming an international organization.
In the late 1980's when Onaga sensei first began teaching on his own, he had only a handful of students and found little or no need to for organizations and the inherent politics that they imply.
20 years later, the number of direct students (Deshi) hasn't grown much. We were 4, now 10, but the number of dojo and second generation students (mago-deshi) has grown significantly.
As a result, in order to help maintain a uniform standard and to ensure that the Okinawan traditions of 'Ti' are passed down to future generations we put together the Bylaws, which were ratified by Onaga sensei on his visit to the Shinjinbukan Issaquah dojo (photo above).
As part of establishing the new association Onaga sensei appointed a group of his senior students to the Riji-Kai (Board of Directors)
The Riji-Kai is just getting started and will need a bit of time to ramp up and figure out the new processes required, stay tuned, more to come from the new board of directors.
First step in building the new association is having members, and that requires registration.