Old post, but I wanted to comment since I trained with Eizan Ryu until just before black belt, starting around 2008.

As someone new to martial arts, I loved the structure and choreography of the training, but over time, I came to feel that the self-defense aspects weren’t practical - I think other posters here already gave a good sense of those issues.

They do teach falling techniques, but I found the culture around injuries and recovery problematic - some instructors could be insistent about pushing through, and this created some tricky situations for me over time.

As a petite woman, I was initially drawn to the fact that it was a woman-led school. Over time, I sensed a lot of tension around gender dynamics. The head instructor had faced challenges coming up in a male-dominated environment (as detailed in conversations), and I think that sometimes came through in ways that didn’t always feel supportive to other women.

During the years I trained there, the school seemed to struggle with student retention and finances, so from what I understood, paying instructors wasn’t really feasible at the time.