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 to certify or not to certify?Moderators: Moderators Jump to page : 1 Now viewing page 1 [25 messages per page] | View previous thread :: View next thread |
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yogi-boy |
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| Hi, Is there compulsory certification for all yoga teachers? All (5) of my yoga teachers have sugggested I teach yoga privately before certification. I'm about to embark on a two year study program and would love to start teaching anyway. Would that be illegal or unethical? My teachers are already using me to substitute for them in their classes and I have a "waiting list" of private students who want me to teach them or their colleaugues. Whats yr opinion...  | |||
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| Bay Guy |
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Expert Yogi Posts: 2479    Location: A Blue State | |||
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| samantha77 |
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Extreme Veteran Posts: 517  Location: New Jersey | |||
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| afroyogi |
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| YogaGuy |
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yogi-boy - 2005-01-31 12:36 PM Hi, Is there compulsory certification for all yoga teachers? All (5) of my yoga teachers have sugggested I teach yoga privately before certification. I'm about to embark on a two year study program and would love to start teaching anyway. Would that be illegal or unethical? My teachers are already using me to substitute for them in their classes and I have a "waiting list" of private students who want me to teach them or their colleaugues. Whats yr opinion... There is no compulsory/mandatory yoga teacher certification in the US (or anywhere else as far as I know). However, Yoga Alliance is trying to start a national registry. They want to set certain minimum standards for certifications and registrations. This is good and bad for reasons I will discuss below. To answer your question in short: NO, it is NOT illegal or unethical to teach without being certified. However, you want to insure yourself before teaching. Many yoga schools and traditions have their own standards for teaching. And many yoga schools defend their trade and servicemarks by requiring teachers to be certified by them before claiming to teach their style. See Bikram. Remember that yoga is a 5000 year old tradition and like all "traditions" it was passed along from generation to generation. In yoga you have the teacher and the student and eventually the student learns enough to begin teaching on his/her own (either with or without the teacher's blessing). Most of our western yoga is from the T. Krishnamacharya lineage: ashtanga, iyengar and vini yoga. Our society places a lot of emphasis on "certification," "documentation," "accreditation," and other pedigrees. This is good being that we are such a consumer driven society, but that is no guaranty of quality. It is merely ONE FACTOR. Here is a statement that seems wrong but isn't: A good teacher has to be a good teacher. Merely having a certificate does not make you a good teacher. Merely being a strong practitioner does not make one a good teacher. Merely studying under a great teacher does not make you a great teacher. These are all important factors, but in the end a teacher has to be a good teacher. Some aspects of being a good teacher are learned and others are innate. If your teachers tell you to teach, then you should go ahead and teach. If you have students that want to study with you, then you probably have something to offer and that's great. Do you need to get certified? NO. HOWEVER, you SHOULD get certified! Why? Several reasons. It makes good business sense. If you are trying to hold yourself out as a teacher, you want to have more qualifications, not less. It will be easier to get insurance. Not only that, but if anything should happen, and you are not certified, it looks really bad to a jury. And because you can't actually learn everything you need in a yoga class, you have to do some studying outside of class. Maybe you have read a lot about yoga and anatomy and teaching techniques, but a good teacher training course will at least introduce you to many of the things that you will need to know and study to be fully versed and ready to tackle teaching safely and smartly. Edited by YogaGuy 2005-01-31 5:43 PM | |||
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| vivage |
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| tourist |
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Expert Yogi Posts: 8442   | Welcome Vivage - nice to see you here from MIS  Certification is an issue that will not go away. I have no choice since I am an Iyengar student. If I want to teach, I go through their training and become certififed when I am ready. However, I did teach before I entered teacher training (although it was the blind leading the blind! Just other yoga friends and I getting together really) and in our system one does begin to teach long before certification, but with a mentor teacher monitoring, constant study, practice and evaluation. My initial reaction to the idea of teaching privately before training struck me as odd, but then I realized I had also done a bit of that, but with no payment. I had given little sessions at home to a few friends. I would have absolutely not been comfortable with being paid for those sessions since my level of knowledge and experrtise was so slim at the time. I think if your teachers say it is time to teach, you should start to teach! If nothing else it teaches you how much you still need to learn. A long list of famous names would not impress me much. Anyone can take a workshop and add the name of ther teacher to their list. It doesn't mean anything was learned there! The long tradition of teacher to student learning was one on one and we don't have that anymore. Those old gurus wouldn't even see a student if s/he hadn't previously demonstrated solid understanding of the yamas and niyamas. Now a student is often accepted into training simply by writing a cheque. If I were looking for a teacher now I would look at their lineage, look at their practice and ask about their philosophy and hope for the best! | ||
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| vivage |
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Hi Tourist, thanks for the welcome.  I like this board, lots of fun folk. Ya know thats how I began thinking about teaching. My (Iyengar) teacher said I was more than ready to teach. It took a little while for me to digest that and after my teacher trainings I realized she was right. I initally took the tt's to deepen my own practice, which it did and then began to see how I could help others. It's been a good journey so far. | |||
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| yogi-boy |
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| Thanks for all yr input! I really value all the different opinions- pretty much the same ones I'm experiencing while coming to a conclusion myself. | |||
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