When Shawn Harvey first started martial arts classes at 14 years old, the sport was all about brute strength.

Now that he’s grown up and running his own martial arts classes through the Bermuda Small Circle Jujitsu Academy, he’s taking a decidedly different approach. To him it’s not just about front snap kicks and high parrys, but about empowering young people to become successful adults. That is why he has implemented the Successful Kids Programme.

“Martial arts taught without a positive mindset is like giving a rifle to a crook,” Mr Harvey said. “In order to transform people you have to transform the way they think. By transforming the way they are thinking they can empower their lives.”

He said when he started doing martial arts it was all about who was the toughest guy in the class.

“It was brute,” he said. “The people who really needed to learn martial arts wouldn’t learn it, because they couldn’t survive the class. I came up through that era, you were bruised up and came home and then went back. You had to be bullheaded to survive that. After that I got involved in a professional martial arts school. Besides just teaching martial arts they were teaching a way of life.”

Mr Harvey trained and earned his first and second degree black belts at New England Small Circle Jujitsu under Sensei Ed Melaugh who is a highly advanced, eighth-degree black belt in Small Circle Jujitsu.

Mr Harvey came up with the Successful Kids programme to help his students ages four to 13 years old improve themselves, not just in the studio, but at home, in the community and at school. It encourages young people listen and focus better, be respectful and speak in positive ways.

“We create this culture where they learn how to become part of a team,” said Mr Harvey. “They learn that we have an instinct to take care of ourselves, but we also need to think of others. The kids read books on leadership, they bring in their homework for us to look at.”

One parent of a nine-year-old son, who did not wish to be named, said the programme had really helped his son to gain confidence.

“He started taking jujitsu with Mr Harvey when he was about four and a half,” said the father. “He went through the Snapping Turtle programme which is for the little ones. He is currently about to test for his orange belt in the next age group, the Blazing Barracudas. I definitely see a level of confidence from a personality perspective. There is a level of respect towards teachers, parents and a level of competitiveness. Would these qualities have all been there without the programme? I don’t know. Granted, he does do other sports as well.”

The father said it was nice that the programme wasn’t seasonal the way many other sports activities are. He also said one advantage that Successful Kids had was that one coach saw the students through the various age levels.

“In a lot of other sports, students get handed off to an older group with a new coach,” he said. “The consistency has been fantastic.”

Mr Harvey said instructors in the programme pay close attention to the confidence level of the student.

“Our whole business model is to transform people’s lives,” he said. “If a child comes in and says I am not confident, we try to help them look at life from a different angle.”

If the participant is struggling in school, then instructors take note, and encourage the child to improve their grades.

“We work on integrity and having mom and dad and the child work on their goals and we hold them to their goals,” said Mr Harvey. “That in itself creates success. When the child achieves that goal, we recognise that. They may get an attitude stripe or a discipline stripe.”

He said the programme was 60 percent boys and 40 percent girls. He is seeing more parents wanting their daughters to learn self-defence.

Mr Harvey said some of the children who come in have been diagnosed with learning challenges such as attention deficit disorder.

“We don’t say here is a problem coming, we say here is a success story about to happen,” said Mr Harvey.

For more information contact the Bermuda Small Circle Jujitsu Academy in the old Berkeley building at 23 Berkeley Road in Pembroke or call them at 292-9234.