Mission Statement of my administration
By Yoshiko Buchanan, President of the American Kyudo Renmei, July 10th, 2010
• Promote the growth of kyudo in America by helping the AKR member federations grow.
• Increase cooperation and information exchange between the AKR member federations.
• Strengthen the relationship between the AKR and the ANKF.
• Strengthen the character of the AKR by emphasizing the development of a kyudo culture in my administration.
• Promote the Pan American growth of kyudo by assisting the growth of kyudo in North and South America and their respective federations.
Policies of my administration
Like all Japanese budo the student teacher relationship is paramount. All AKR policies must be careful to make sure such relationships are never harmed by any AKR actions or bylaws. Every AKR member has a strong relationship with his or her teacher involving trust and compassion. It will be a primary policy of my administration to rely on the strong relationship between students and teachers as the foundation of any kyudo group or federation. It follows from this that the strength created by such organizations can be a source of strength to enrich the AKR.
The mission of my administration is to support the growth of the US kyudo community with a better understanding of kyudo culture as a Japanese budo. This is the primary task of the AKR. While administration and political work are an important part of any national federation it will be a policy of my administration to not give such activities top priority. The measure of success by the AKR cannot only be counted in membership but it must also be in the growth of a kyudo culture within the AKR. I will have a policy of practical action in pursuing these policies as opposed to stating vague philosophical goals.
Activities:
There are immediate actions that can be taken. The AKR web site is a valuable tool in pursuing the goals I have for the AKR and it has been sitting, unused, for far too long. Even before taking office I asked Carly Born to work on getting the web page up and E.Clay Buchanan to help fill it with useful content. I’m happy to say that the effort was successful and I intend to expand the web page to include content and event announcements from all the member federations. I intend to make the web page a central place to increase communications from the AKR to member federations and I would also like to use it to disseminate information from the ANKF to AKR members in English. To do this we should strengthen the translation committee to introduce articles or summarizes of articles from the ANKF Kyudo Magazine. I can envision an “ANKF Corner” to introduce ANKF activities and give a feeling of connection with the kyudo community in Japan. An “Event Information Corner” could provide more opportunity to connect federation members with events happening around America. Those are just a few ideas but the AKR web site will be better and more useful with your help and participation.
Besides improving the web site I can think of other ways to use the internet to assist in planning and running tournaments and seminars. We could plan a “Correspondence Tournament” and we would like to have some volunteers to organize it. Again your participation is important and needed. “Seminars of the Americas” is the largest event of the AKR and regularly includes a tournament as well.
The use of internet calling and conference facilities could help in overcoming the problems of meeting over such a large area.
Participation, Cooperation and support:
In order to execute these plans some of the AKR members will be asked or assigned jobs rather than forming committees. When one job is well organized and done adequately such work may start forming a committee naturally. I would like to have the job done first. The new officer will try their best but AKR matters are, at the same time, matters of the member federations and by extension a matter of each individual archer. Your participation and cooperation to work with the new officers is a very important part of the social aspect of kyudo study, I believe.
Administration:
It would be truly wonderful if we have no problems or political disputes among the federations. However we are all different and there will be some issues that we have to discuss and resolve. I am hoping we will manage such issues swiftly and adequately when they arise and not allow them to consume the majority of our time and efforts. As the AKR board members realize that there are outstanding issues from the last board meeting in Tokyo such as discussions about items such as “Disciplinary action” procedures, defining the “Annual Roster” issue, “defining Mentorship “ and so on. I want to resolve these issues quickly so that we can move forward.
Yoshiko Buchanan
July 10, 2010