No, I don't mean who is your Instructor?

I mean, when you are training in class, do you work with other women, men, or sometimes one or the other?

My personal feeling (and I mean NO DISRESPECT TO ANYONE), is that if women only train with other women they are not being prepared for a realistic situation where they are attacked by a man.

I'm interested to know what other students/instructors feel about this.

Les

I completely agree, I believe a co-ed MA training environment would more realistically help women prepare for any dangerous encounters they may face. After all, males do tend to be the majority of perpetrators of crimes, and of crimes against women. At my dojang the classes are all co-ed... :asian:

co-ed for me too.

In my school, we train together. Men and women. You're right. women have to train with men. Men are stronger.

I've never had an option, I've been the only female in all the classes I've taken, except for once for about 3 or 4 months. The woman in question was a real psychopath and would really try and hurt you, so I avoided her whenever I could. So did everyone else. The sensei had to ask her to leave in the end because she just would not stop trying to really hurt people.

I quite like training with men, but to be honest I'd prefer a more mixed atmosphere.

We make sure we train with everyone in class. We have pretty much equal ratio of female to males so we just mix and match :)
Sparring... we spar everyone too. Just rotate down the line. It works out great as we have 6' males and 5' females. If you just turn around and always work with the same person behind or infront of you.. that doesn't give you or them a good sampling of partners which I think is important.
Reality doesn't see a 5'1 woman attacking a 6' male but hey ya never know.. so be prepared *G*

Respectfully,

Tess

Hi everyone :asian:

There are no other women in my class. A few have come & gone over the years but never long enough to attain a higher level of ability. I would prefer a more mixed class though.

To reach a realistic level of skill, I also think it is necessary to train with both genders as you never know how, why or when that skill may have to be used.

gum

I'm 1 of 3 women in my class right now. Not counting Sensei, there are about 6 or 7 men in the class all different in height, build, and strength. Everyone works with everyone else and that's how I feel like it should be. :asian:

Robyn :yinyang:

I don't discriminate against any one who wants to train with me. Whether its male or female or what ever. And when push comes to shove, if you've been training with both men and women, you'll know how to handle yourself against either.