Jodobu Annual Report for CY2007

Andy Watson, Seishinkan Dojo, Ealing

This year has seen some significant changes in the Jodobu including myself, taking up the Bucho post from Alan Nash after many years of hard service, Vito Tattoli also resigning from the role of Squad Manager to be taken over again by Alan. He obviously doesn’t have enough to do with his time. Harry Jones continues in her role as Other Member.

The regular national BKA seminars and gradings took place as normal with the Spring Seminar in Stevenage, the Summer Seminar very well attended in Brighton and more recently the Northern Seminar in Darlington. It was very gratifying to see such a splendid growth in the Darlington Seminar, this being the second year running where Ian Applegarth has had to seek new premises to hold it. I believe there was something close to 80 attendees at this year’s event with about 20 of those doing Jodo. Luckily Darlington is blessed with two very new and spacious college facilities where I believe we could continue to grow the seminar well past 120 attendees. Eishinkan and Seishinkan Dojos also hosted an Iaido and Jodo Koryu seminar in the spring where we were able to get Ishido Sensei and Nakada Sensei to visit. The seminar topped at some 120 attendees and Stevenage once again provided excellent facilities to hold the seminar, accommodate everyone and allow everyone to get something to eat in the evenings.

The new Coaching Programme finally took off after lots of development and help from Ian Parker Dodd. The programme currently has the Level 1 Coach course fully endorsed and in the new year the assignment of Regional and National Coaches will take place. Furthermore the Level 1 course will be further spread and the development of Level 2 will be completed for delivery.

The European Iaido and Jodo Championship saw another wonderful success for the Jodo 3-man team, who apart from myself, were made up of completely new members, Aurelien Nacrour (3d) and Lucy Earley (2d), who despite their newness to this environment took several 3rd and 4th dan heads. Well done guys! The full results including those who received awards in the individuals can be found at: http://www.eic-ejc2007.com/main.php?langage=EN

One of my first actions when taking up this role was to develop a Jodobu Strategy to develop both the quantity of members and the quality of jodo in the UK through a pragmatic structured approach. The strategy first called for the formation of a Steering Group made up of senior jodo members. More information regarding this will be included in the soon to be written Jodobu newsletter giving more detail to 2007’s events as well as the plan for 2008.

Gradings this year at UK events went very well with 56 people applying for gradings and 52 passing (95%) the stats of which are shown left.

A sad farewell to Keith Dawick, Iaido and Jodo Grading Officer who is resigning from his post to focus on other activities. Keith has been, in my short experience as Bucho, at the foremost, professional as well as mind-bogglingly reliable and well prepared; even when he could not attend the summer seminar he managed to get the entire grading kit to me in the post and made sure that even someone with my lack of organizational skills was able to understand what to do. A heartfelt thank you, Keith. The role of Grading Officer will be incorporated into the Bu and an announcement made of the appointment in due time.

I would like to express my thanks to the following individuals for their help and support this year (and hope it continues next year too!): Alan Nash for his sterling hard work in keeping the Jodobu running and growing; Chris Buxton for his ever reliable organizing and money handling skills in the summer seminar and other times; Vito Tattoli for all his years of effort in managing the most consistently winning squad in the BKA; my teacher Chris Mansfield for his drive to change people and push the art forward; Jock Hopson, especially for being at my wing when my Japanese protocol skills fall short; Greg and Lesley Drewe for sorting out facilities for seminars, squad training and virtually the future of Jodo in the UK; Vic Cook for his continued support from the Iaidobu; Ian Applegarth for preserving Jodo’s place in Darlington; and Harry Jones for helping me maintain a sense of humour through the various events and our 5th dan grading.