Article: "To avoid marrying a jerk, singles educators say you should stay out of bed on the first date and cross-examine your partner. Critics say their advice is hokum."

And so it was that last February, for the first time in his life, Majuk, a 40-year-old electrician from Queens, N.Y., found himself itching to get hitched. He'd been dating a cute ministry student for a month and he didn't want to mess up a good thing. So he registered for John Van Epp's daylong dating skills seminar How to Avoid Marrying a Jerk, which teaches single people and those currently dating how to bond with partners and avoid wasting time with, well, jerks. There, he learned about Van Epp's "Relationship Attachment Model," which cautions daters to beware of the false intimacy of insta-relationships and encourages them to really get to know their new companions before they trust them, commit to them or sleep with them.

Majuk had only been seeing his new girlfriend for a few hours a couple of times a week, but after the seminar he worried that they were moving too fast. Following the tips he picked up from Van Epp, he told her that he thought they should do a lot more conversing and a lot less cuddling, and was relieved when she agreed. Twelve months later -- and with a longer version of Van Epp's course under his belt (this one was given over five Sundays at a Queens church) -- Majuk, now 41, says they are "on track" for marriage.

I'm still very skeptical about all these classroom gimmicks. They can't replace a person's own common sense. The one size-fits all for all ages and cultural backgrounds seems hokey to me.


Tags: seminar, singles