SafeSkills, Inc.

Our last history-of-the-dojo post is of people who trained at SafeSkills. These photos are a moment in time of some dojo people.

Thank you all for being a part of the SafeSkills dojo. We are truly honored to have been a part of your life. Thank you for trusting us to be your Sensei and for being so open-hearted in your training. Each one of you, is, and will always be, a strong and gentle martial artist.

While we held down the dojo with karate and arnis classes, we also taught self-defense for women workshops at the dojo and anywhere that we were hired to teach. We taught through Duke, UNC, NC State, Elon, Pembroke, Meredith and Peace College. Most r**e crisis centers or domestic violence shelters brought us in for workshops. We traveled throughout NC, VA, and SC to teach. It was not unusual for us to teach several workshops a week, reaching many more women in on-site porgrams.

As we taught more women, we got requests for us to teach special workshops for teen girls, co-ed and LGBT or other hate crimes. This community outreach helped more people create safety in their lives and discover that “Safe is something within you”.

SafeSkills' EmPOWERment Padded Mock Attacker Self-Defense Training was a highly specialized self-defense course which featured a “Padded Mock Attacker” in which women participants could do full power techniques on a male instructor who was specifically trained to wear protective padding. The course was 25 hours long taught over 5 weekends and a participant had to do the basic four hour workshop first along with a pre-registration interview to make sure she was ready for the course. It was intense but powerful! For the nearly 5 years we taught this program, we helped many women. A large number of women who were assault, r**e or in**st survivors found this course to be a powerful healing process.

Sensei Kathy and Sensei Beth wanted the dojo space to be full of creativity. We were so lucky to have many creative people such as Sheila Kerrigan, a professional mime, juggler and one of our black belts. She taught several movement workshops at the dojo. Terry Graedon, one of our black belts, with her husband, Joe, offered a People's Pharmacy talk “New Year, New You” at the dojo. Sensei Beth taught "Back In Balance" classes for Seniors. Sensei Kathy had art classes for kids and art salons for adults to reach out to the art community. The dojo space was rented for Tai Chi , yoga, Chi Gung events and astrology with Stephan Forrest. We also had many, many drum circles and classes raising the dojo roof with the heart beat of our drums.

The teen and adult karate classes continued on at our new location. While these photos are not of everyone who was in the dojo at that time, we are honored to have been a part of so many people's lives.

The children's karate classes continued on at our new location. We were honored to have been a part of many children's lives.

Here is what one karateka has to say recently about growing up with the dojo:

The ten years I spent taking classes there from the age of 8 to 18 had an enormously positive physical, mental, and emotional impact on my life. I learned more than karate - I learned how to give and receive constructive criticism, how to take a deep, centering breath before doing something that made me nervous, and to think about my mistakes as learning points. I learned not to be afraid of the sound of my voice, to stand up in front of a class and lead, to teach other people (even people twice my age!). I am so grateful for Sensei Beth and Sensei Kathy for their energy, thoughtfulness, patience with my occasionally bad teenage attitude, dedication, and love.

The Shannon Plaza location was sold without any prior "For Sale" notice, resulting in the rent being raised more than we could afford. The hunt for a new dojo space was on again and quick! After looking at many locations, we found a new space across town on Hillsborough Road. We taught our last class on a Thursday at Shannon Plaza and moved over a week-end. Whew – that really was a task!

The new space was a dream space! BUT you really had to “dream” it because it was a mess from previously being a place for printing large posters. This amazing space had heating, air-conditioning, a separate lobby area, a small kitchen nook, 2 upstairs dressing rooms, a storage closet under the stairs and a smaller room to teach one on one. Plus it had 2 bathrooms – one with a shower!

Well of course, we start off with renovations in our new dojo on Hillsborough Road. We had very little time to get the new space in shape so we started classes while still doing renovations. Our priority was to get the large room carpet down, so that classes resume. Sensei Beth and Sensei Kathy were there 24/7 while students helped whenever possible. Within the first 3 weeks, we had most things in place and were looking forward to our grand opening...

We were lucky to have summer camps at the Shannon Plaza Dojo. We offered camps such as Art, Art, Movement Arts, Around the World with Martial Arts, Everything Arts and Exploring Asian Arts.These day long camps exercised the camper's bodies while stretching their minds with karate, art, yoga, geography, history, martial arts culture and plenty of games. Each camper got a camp booklet, white belt and participated in an art show, yoga and karate demonstration. Sensei Beth got to play African drums and everyone danced!

1988 “Woman As Leader: A Teacher's Conference” Geneva, NY. Sensei Kathy taught at this conference for martial arts teachers followed by teaching at the ST '88 Camp. What did she teach at ST? Sparring! Two classes: Sparring Level 1 and Sparring Level 2. These were designed for women who were beginning to spar, were scared of sparring or were in a non-sparring martial arts style. You had to bring your pillow to the class to play “Pillow Softies” sparring game.

1990 Sensei Beth taught at ST '90 Camp in New Haven, CT. She taught 3 classes at camp: “Introduction to Physical Self-Defense Strategies”, “Verbal Self-Defense Confrontation Strategies” and “De-Escalation: Defusing Conflictive Encounters”. These 3 classes covered a range of self-protection skills and concepts with the goal of creating more options beyond just the physical skills of self-defense.

1992 Sensei Beth taught at ST '92 Camp in Haverford, PA. She taught 3 classes in Modern Arnis: “Strikes and Disarms”, Flowing Partners” and “Finger Locking Connections”. Professor Remy Presas, our Modern Arnis instructor, would have been proud of her!

2005 Sensei Kathy taught at ST '05 Camp in Shepherdstown, WVA. She taught “Games, Drills and Thrills I, II & III, Creating Martial Arts Games for Children” Dragon Pole, Left-Right Bean Bag, Zombie Tag, Noodle Zap, Crane & Zen and Electrical Charge were some of the games she taught to other instructors to teach in their schools.

Many of the women in our dojo attended Special Training Camps sponsored by National Women's Martial Arts Federation (NWMAF). These camps, started in 1976 and continues to this day. The women who attended those first few camps are some of the pioneers of the feminist women's martial arts and self-defense movement. Each year the four day camp was located in a different state usually on a college campus. A camp participant could sample a variety of martial arts under a variety of highly skilled women martial artists. NWMAF and S.T. camps were an important step for women and girls in martial arts. Women instructors or women who owned their own school served as role models for other women. Self-defesne concepts, skills and research was so willingly shared that eventually, we even had a pre-camp confernce focusing on self-defense instruction.

Adults continued karate and arnis classes in the new Shannon Plaza Dojo. As the young karateka grew, they joined the adult classes. Looking back at photos, it is clear to see how hard everyone worked out, took their training seriously and gave 100%. Besides practicing kicks, punches, blocks, take-downs, stick strikes and disarms, people sweated their way through their own personal challenges. Some people came to the dojo with athletic ability, some came with little or no prior physical experiences, some came with special physical challenges or in search of healing from assault or abuse, but whatever someone walked in the dojo door with, all were welcome in our dojo. I don't know how many times Sensei Kathy said that, specially in the children's class circle, “Everyone is welcome in our dojo”!

Let the classes begin. In this new space we were able to offer more martial arts classes and triple our number of self-defense workshops open to the public. There was plenty of parking in the parking lot and it was a location that was easy to find near the U.S. Post office. Our co-ed classes expanded as did our children's and Arnis classes. Many people came through these doors as we offered summer camps, art shows and a highly specialized self-defense class called emPOWERment. We had several black belt tests in this dojo!

Children's Karate classes started growing as we focused on meditation, stretching, punches, kicks, stances, blocks, using patience, learning stillness, facing disappointment, jumping with joy – all part of the children training in our dojo...oh and let's not forget Dragon-Pole!

After eight years in the dojo on Mangum Street we needed to move. Needed more space that actually had a parking lot. So the hunt for a new dojo space was on. We found Shannon Plaza on the other side of town. It was a 2000 square foot space that had been empty for many years near the Post Office. This large open space had four big bright windows letting in lots of light, one bathroom, a tiny closet that we used for an office, an odd shaped space we carved into two small dressing rooms and a small but useable kitchen. Plus, drum roll please – HEATING & AIR-CONDITIONING!

Although minor compared to our first dojo, there were renovations to do before we could move in to start classes. We were ready to rip, cut, nail, sheet-rock and paint.

A large, very well-built stage had to be pryed up from the floor, cut into smaller pieces and moved. We had several doors which lead into the space next door so those had to be walled off. Needed dressings rooms which required more framing, sheet-rock, priming and painting the logo on the walls. So the renovations began!

TWKA was also growing in other ways at our first Mangum Street Dojo in Durham, NC.
Along with the new dojo, we added in other classes such as our Arnis and children's classes. Sensei Beth and Sensei Kathy taught endless amounts of self-defense workshops for women at the new dojo and in the larger community. We also had a name change since we were teaching co-ed Arnis classes along with co-ed children's classes. So we changed from Triangle Women's Karate Association to Triangle Women's Martial Arts. Keeping the “Women” in our name was our way of claiming our space for women first.

Part of the growth was doing community events such as r**e awareness rallies and public demonstrations of martial or self-defense. We did a ton of these in any and every way we could.

Over the years, we brought in many guest instructors. Sensei Bobbi Snyder was the first to teach at the Mangum Street dojo. Sensei Bobbi taught three workshops over the weekend. The first one was point-sparring. We had corner judges with point flags and Bobbi was the referee. What fun! No one was hurt while everyone gained a new perspective about sparring. Sensei Bobbi also taught joint lock concepts and the rhythm within a kata. I remember having to recite “Mary Had a Little Lamb” while doing the kata so that we could understand full focus in performing a kata while building a rhythm. We also got really good at reciting Mary Had A Little Lamb.
Sensei Jaye Spiro was the next instructor we brought in to the Mangum Street dojo. She taught foundation concepts of Kihon: Basics and sparring drills. At one point in the Kihon class, we were holding onto a partner's legs trying to hold them back while they tried to move forward from the center of their body in a stance. What tiring fun! Sparring drills and then free form sparring was my favorite! Love that sparring!

While we were known to be a dojo for women and children, we also taught a co-ed class in Modern Arnis. This Filipino martial art is done with empty hands – no weapons – plus short rattan canes and knives. Arnis added much flow and graceful speed to our karate style with movements becoming a blended beautiful and strong base of techniques. We continue to do trapping hands drills along with many other techniques from Arnis.

After opening the Mangum Street dojo, Beth & Kathy started teaching children's class. That was something since neither of us had taught children before! We soon discovered eaching children is an entirely different ball game than teaching adults. What I came to understand is that if you can think like a child, you can teach them. Of course it took a while to figure that important concept out. We still know some of these children, though now they are all grown up and have become parents, writers, teachers, artists and just all around good people. We are honored to have been part of their lives as they were the start of teaching the Gentle Spirit Karate classes in our dojo.

The new floor was shiny and clean, ready for the first work out! We continued our commitment to being a women's dojo. That was important because so few women were in martial art's schools in those days. A lone woman here and there but it was rare to have a group of women training. Women instructors or women actually OWNING a dojo was most unusual. The feminist women's martial arts and self-defense movement was slowly growing thus making an impact to change this. Still it was both physically and emotionally risky for many women to train in a mixed dojo. Sexism as alive and well and we were setting out to change part of that!

Mangum Street Dojo 1984-1994
After 2 years of renting various spaces, we made the leap to renting a full time commercial space for our first dojo. In July 1984, Beth and Kathy signed the lease for a 1200 square foot space on North Mangum Street in Durham at Old Five Points. The space had been empty for a long time and may have originally been a car dealership. The sloping floor made of hundreds of 8-sided old fashioned small bathroom tiles would not lend to moving smoothly across in karate stances, nor was there much hope that the old paster walls would not crumble as we worked out or that there was anyway we could transform this complete mess of a space into a dojo. But being martial artists, we had spirit, skill and sheer determination to do so. Let the renovations began! Oh did I mention there was no heating or air-conditioning but there were lights in the ceiling and it did have a bathroom!

Perhaps we did not acknowledge the enormity of the task we set out to do – floor tiles to clean from years of much accumulated dirt, load after load of trash to haul away, bags of mortar to plaster the walls, wood joists to rip for the new floor, sheets of plywood to carry, cut, and nail down – more spackling, more painting, more sweeping, more trash, more mopping, the work seemed endless. Yet weeks and weeks later, it was finished. The work was finally done by Beth, Kathy and many dojo students.

Since we are closing our doors at the end of Sept we have been looking back to see what we accomplished. We decided to share photos from our 33 years of teaching. Before we actually rented a full time commercial space in Durham, we taught in various locations in both Chapel Hill and Durham including the Wesley Center, UNC married student housing community room, Durham YWCA, JJ Henderson Towers, and various churches. We were always lugging around lots of training equipment to each class! Kathy was an unstoppable creator of ideas so we were also sponsoring many events such as talks, demos and workshops. Our original name was Triangle Karate Women’s Karate Association (TWKA). One of the first events we did was the Southern’s Women’s Martial Arts weekend in Chapel Hill Oct. 15-17 1982. Over 30 women attended from Baltimore, Atlanta and Savannah and of course, our students at that time. We managed to organize, house, and feed all the participants ourselves! Here are photos from that event.

Thirty-three years ago Beth and Kathy set out to create a safe, independent space for people to train in martial arts and self-defense. SafeSkills has has grown and evolved over these many years becoming an amazing journey for us and all our students. We are very sad to have to say that the SafeSkills journey is ending. For this, we are truly sorry.
Rising rents and operating costs means we can no longer maintain a financially sustainable space. Our lease ends on September 30th. We have considered every option to stay open before making this difficult decision. It has been the toughest decision we have had to make.
We plan to continue to offer one hour talks for corporations, agencies and businesses.
We are teaching one last self-defense for women workshop on Sept 12. We hope that you may be interested in attending or will share with friends to be able participate in this last opportunity. Visit safeskills.com for details.
From the bottom of our hearts, we want to thank you for being a friend and supporter of what SafeSkills has achieved over 33 years.
With much respect,
Kathy and Beth

Partner yoga in the kids' karate class.

The young karateka were awesome on their test!

Everyone did a great job during the teen/adult test!

Congratulations to all the young karateka on their big day!