The state board that oversees private, postsecondary career schools unanimously voted Tuesday to deny yoga teacher-training schools an exemption from state regulation.
The exemption was proposed by Yoga Alliance, a nationwide advocate for schools that train yoga instructors, on behalf of the 12 Arkansas schools that received letters from the state in July stipulating that they become licensed by Sept. 1 in order to continue their programs.
After multiple meetings with the agency earlier this year about their concerns -- including fees and other obligations that come with government oversight as well as the fact that the yoga community already has a means of self-regulation -- the schools united with Yoga Alliance in October to stand against the Board of Private Career Education.
Asking for a blanket exemption Tuesday was the schools' first major move to halt the regulation process, Yoga Alliance attorney Paul Charton said.
Board members agreed that yoga teacher training falls under the agency's authority, though Charton argued yoga teacher training was avocational and outside the board's purview.
Under state law, programs are exempt from regulation by the Board of Private Career Education if they are offered for avocational or recreational personal improvement and not for the purpose of enhancing an occupational objective. The board oversees schools for fields such as real estate, bail bonds, and tattooing and body piercing.
"Along with our members in the Arkansas yoga community, we are troubled by the board's efforts to impose extensive and expensive requirements on yoga teacher training programs in this state," Barbara Dobberthien, chief operating officer of Yoga Alliance, wrote in an email. "Yoga teacher training programs are attended primarily by individuals who want to continue their own personal practice. Treating these programs like career training and overburdening studios with fees and unnecessary requirements only hurts the yoga community and small business in Arkansas."
Sherri Youngblood, owner of Sage Yoga School in Little Rock, told board members she would be forced to close her school if licensure -- and its average annual fee of $2,125 -- is required.
"The license fee for everybody was just a phenomenal amount of money," Youngblood said, adding that her school trains four to 10 yoga instructors each year and charges $2,000 in tuition per student.
Brenda Germann, director of the Board of Private Career Education, said the state agency would work with the schools to create more specific requirements to regulate yoga teacher training, including a possible fee change. Changing the requirements would require a 30-day notice, a public hearing and a filing with the secretary of state's office. That process would start in May, she said.
Youngblood said that, more than the licensing fee, she objects to idea that teaching yoga is a profession.
Yoga studio owners and owners of yoga teacher-training schools, including Youngblood, sent letters to the agency earlier this month, telling board members that yoga instructors do not make their livings from teaching yoga and often have separate careers.
"I've been an intensive care unit nurse for going on 27 years, and I certainly never thought of my yoga school as a career," Youngblood said. "And that was the luxury of it. I can just give from my heart and soul and keep to the definition of what yoga is. I certainly emphasize to my students that yoga is a certification. It's not a license, and it's not a career path."
Germann said yoga teacher-training schools were "not a hobby" and needed to be regulated for consumers' -- as well as the schools' -- protection.
"We'll have to agree to disagree," Germann told Charton. "They're teaching people how to be instructors, and our law says any entity that leads to or enhances occupational qualifications (is subject to regulation). My belief is, if you take the course and pass it, you can go out and instruct."
Now that the exemption has been denied, each school will be sent another letter stating they are required to apply for either licensure or exemption, Germann said.
Christopher Comer, chairman of the board, said the agency wasn't willing to grant industry-wide exemption but would consider exemption on a case-by-case basis.
Charton argued that asking for schools to apply for an exemption was a "guilty until proven innocent standard."
Charton said Yoga Alliance would continue pursuing a blanket exemption for the Arkansas schools.
Metro on 12/17/2014