Question 059: ATA philosophy

I noticed that at one time you trained and earned your first TKD black belt in the pre-songham ATA. I found this interesting because I recently earned my ATA black belt and love the philosophy and values of this organization. From what I have learned from your website, ATA philosophy and values seem to be very similar to Taekwondo America philosophy and values. Would you agree?

In the 1980’s a group of ATA instructor’s left the organization and formed the USTA (United States Taekwondo Alliance), which later became the ITA (International Taekwondo Alliance). In the 1990’s, a group of USTA instructor left the organization and formed TA (Taekwondo America). In the 2000’s, another group of instructors left the ITA and joined TA. This means that most of the TA senior instructors had their start in the original ITF based ATA. People always remember best that which they learned first, so there is still a lot of the old ATA values in the TA senior ranks.