For many martial arts students gradings are a way of measuring their progress and, when organised properly, will ensure that when you visit other clubs within the same system you can tell at a glance who knows what.
Generally speaking the Japanese (and Korean etc) martial arts do this very well whereas the Chinese martial arts do it either very badly or not at all.
This short article examines why this is so and the pleasures as well as the pitfalls of martial art grading systems.
Why gradings are popular.
To start with lets look at why grading remains popular among both students and their schools.
For students gradings offer the following advantages:

• A measurement of your progress to date.
  
• A way of measuring the skill level and experience of your classmates.
  
• If sparring is involved it's a way of ensuring that equally skilled participants are pitted together.
  

What's in it for the schools:

• A way of keeping track of who has reached which point in their syllabus.
  
• A powerful way of motivating students and keeping them on target.
  
• An extra source of revenue.
  

The reason why the Japanese do this so well is that their martial art systems tend to be rigorously codified so that the same martial art can be taught in much the same way anywhere in the world, at least that's the theory.
They have powerful governing bodies set up that control the syllabus and gradings etc to maintain standards.
What should happen is that the person who does the grading is not the person who taught that student to eliminate any bias and to ensure that the grade has been fairly earned and awarded.
In this manner the quality of the training can be maintained and it makes it far easier for both students and teachers, both of whom know exactly what is expected of them to teach or earn a grade.
So why doesn't it work in kung fu? The way that gradings work (or don't work) in kung fu points out the vast differences between Chinese and Japanese martial arts.
The first point to remember is that gradings as we recognise them have only existed in any martial arts since the beginning of the 20th Century.
Before this time they were neither used nor needed.
They were originally introduced by Kana Jigora�, the founder of judo and later introduced to other East Asia countries.
The change came about through a gradual change in the focus of martial arts from a necessary form of protection of yourself, family and business into a form of sport.
If you are training martial arts for your survival then it doesn't matter what grade you or an aggressor is.
If, on the other hand, you are training to use your skills in a sporting arena then it became useful to ensure that fighters were matched with another fighter of similar skill level.
As the martial arts became more competition oriented so the syllabus changed.
Specific techniques were developed and given names so that everyone who studied that system would learn the same techniques.
This range of techniques would define the school.
Offshoots of a school would use largely the same syllabus but some techniques would differ or be done in different ways.
The regular gradings ensured conformity to the syllabus.
There are many reasons why this situation wasn't mirrored in China.
Here are some of them:

• China is a huge country with a vast range of fighting styles.
  Many of these styles had too many techniques to break down into a set syllabus.
  The skills were taught through forms which consisted of a series of movements.
  Each of those movements represented a range of different techniques that could be adapted at a moments notice depending on the changing circumstances.
  The forms were passed on from master to student without being committed to paper.
  It was largely believed that writing down the techniques or movements of a form would make the form static.
  People would follow it dogmatically and argue about the right way to do it.
  This would hugely detract from the form and prevent it adapting to suit changing circumstances.
  It was simply too difficult to write everything down including the hundreds of variations and codify it, particularly as a large percentage of the practitioners were illiterate farmers.
  The only possible way of grading would depend on how well a student could perform a form.
  But a form could be done in many different ways without it being 'wrong'.
  Hence the difficulty in unbiased gradings.
  
• Most, if not all of China's martial art schools were taught in the Confucian way.
  That is the school became a family with the teacher as the father and the students as the older or younger brothers and sisters.
  The relationship between teacher and student was much greater than that of teacher and student in the West.
  The idea of using a fixed grading system would have been seen as unnecessary and divisive and against Confucian principles.
  
• Chinese martial artists are far less interested in competition in the way Japanese are.
  If two rival kung fu schools were to compete they would simply match their best men against each other.
  Gradings would be irrelevant.
  The winning school would gain 'face' and so be better able to attract new students.
  In fact it used to be the case in parts of China that if two schools were to compete then the master of the winning school would have the legal right to take over the school of the losing master.
  

Although gradings aren't part of the rich history of Chinese martial arts many kung fu schools have adopted the practice.
Many now offer a coloured belt (or sash) system feeling perhaps that this is what a Western public expects from a martial arts school.
Unfortunately this system is widely open to abuse from the following:

• Schools using the grading system simply as a way of making money from their students.
  This is the most pernicious form.
  If a school insists on grading regularly and charges a lot for it then the students are possibly being ripped off.
  At the end of the day if a school isn't involved in competition with others of the same system then what is the grading system for?
• Teachers giving better grades to their favourite students or just letting everyone pass for turning up.
  In this way the grade has no value.
  
• Teachers letting their friends do the grading as a way of making money for them.
  Their friends will then let them grade their students in kind.
  
• Offering black belt training in record time.
  Eg "Gain a black belt in 3 months with our intensive training programme.
  " Anyone can give you a load of training for a lot of money then give you a black belt at the end of it.
  But how good is that training and how would you fare against someone who earned their belt the hard way over 7 years of intense effort? Why not just go to your local sports shop and buy a black belt to wear? It will have much the same value.
  These are called black belt factories and cash in on the public love of the phrase 'black belt' which most take to signify expert.
  

Beware the kung fu cowboys! The sins mentioned above are far from exclusive to kung fu, all martial arts have their 'McDojos' and 'black belt factories'.
However, kung fu is probably the worst at this and grading systems can be seen as another symptom of the degeneration of the Chinese martial arts.
Fortunately there are still many schools that haven't adopted it and still teach good kung fu without the need for gradings, uniforms, membership fee and insurance scams that have turned many, possibly once great, kung fu schools into enterprises that take lots of money from their students but offer little in return.
Good kung fu offers so much in the way of physical, mental and even spiritual development as well as awesome fighting skills but such schools are increasingly few and far between.
Too many schools are taught by people with little genuine training who take advantage in the lack of control over kung fu schools to teach nonsense and charge the earth for it.
These 'kung fu cowboys' are ruining the reputations of all Chinese martial arts and the public needs to know they're out there and how to spot them.
Here is some general advice for those seeking good, genuine kung fu training:

• Look at the fluidity and skill level of the master and his senior students when performing moves.
  Are they able to overcome lesser students with apparent effortlessness?
• Is the school purely a kung fu school or does it teach kung fu with some kickboxing and MMA or other martial arts mixed in? If so why? If the kung fu is good it shouldn't need to be diluted with other combat training.
  
• Similarly what is the background of the master and other teachers.
  Is it purely kung fu or is there a long list of other martial arts that they have cross trained in?
• What is the style of kung fu.
  If they just say it's kung fu walk away.
  There are hundreds of styles of kung fu.
  If they say it's Shaolin style, walk away as there is no such thing and never has been.
  Dozens of styles were taught in the Shaolin temple.
  
• Look at the costs involved.
  Are they charging a lot per hour, plus uniform, plus insurance, plus gradings, plus summer camps, plus membership fees etc etc.
  Most genuine teachers aren't out for the money but for the enjoyment of teaching and trying to find that rarest of beings, keen students who will commit decades to their training then be willing to pass on that knowledge to others.
  

Kung fu schools the future is up to you.
The reputation of kung fu has not been too good.
We know our martial arts is good so let's make our schools centres of excellence with quality tuition of exceptional skills at reasonable prices.
Let real kung fu live on for another 1500 years.