Universal Taekwondo (officially known as Australian Universal Tae Kwon Do) was originally started by Master Ray Tan, 8th Dan, more than 40 years ago. We’ve changed names and locations, but some of the students of original members still train with us today. We currently have two branches, Scarborough Universal Taekwondo and Mount Lawley Universal Taekwondo. Stuart Argus (5th Dan) is the club head instructor, and main instructor at the Scarborough branch with John Macleod (5th Dan) the main instructor at the Mount Lawley branch.
Out club ethos is to teach taekwondo because we love it, not to make a living – so we keep costs as low as possible. We don’t lock you into long-term contracts because we know people are busy, get sick, go on holidays or have exams etc. We aim for a casual, fun environment.
Universal Taekwondo are proud members of the national body for taekwondo, Australian Taekwondo. Our instructors are internationally recognised and all hold Kukkiwon certificates.
While we are a WTF club, the sparring style we practice is more similar to International Taekwondo Federation (ITF). We don’t enter tournaments or practice Olympic style sparring – our focus is on sparring for self-defence and fitness. However, a lot of the skills are transferable – we’ve had a student get their black belt with us, then change to tournament club and become a state champion within one year.
We mainly use English terminology in our classes – no need to memorise the name of each kick and block in Korean – but we do use a few Korean words e.g.. ‘start (chi ja)’ ‘stop (geuman)’ ‘turn (vertrot)’ ‘bow (cheriup kenneng)’.
At the start of class, students recite the club oath: “As a student of Univeral Taekwondo, I will develop my mind and body. I will respect my instructors and fellow students, and demonstrate the spirit of taekwondo at all times.”