Our History

A Brief History

In February 2001, Northern Lights School of Massage Therapy joined with the Minnesota Center for Shiatsu Study to become CenterPoint Massage & Shiatsu Therapy School & Clinic. This partnership came together naturally. The two schools united in order to offer a greater number of quality services to students, clients and the general public, and better respond to the national trend in bodywork education by developing comprehensive and integrated career training programs.

Northern Lights School of Massage Therapy (NLSMT) was founded in 1985 by Jackson Petersburg, Sally Niemand and Linny Siems in response to a regional demand for high quality, entry-level career training in massage therapy. NLSMT was an early member of the American Massage Therapy Association (AMTA) Council of Schools. The AMTA Council of Schools is instrumental in advising and instructing schools about national training standards in massage therapy education.  It was a registered school in Minnesota according to Minnesota Statutes 136A.61 to 136A.71 starting in 1985. NLSMT became licensed as a private career school in 1999 by the Educational Approval Board for the state of Wisconsin. Since its inception, NLSMT graduated over 800 students.

The Minnesota Center for Shiatsu Study (MCSS) began in the spring of
1992. Founder and Director Cari Johnson Pelava, having returned from a year of shiatsu study in Japan, designed the Professional Shiatsu Training Program based on the influence of her Japanese mentors and according to the standards for education recommended by the American Organization of Bodywork Therapies of Asia (AOBTA). She was dedicated to creating the first high quality professional training program in shiatsu therapy in Minnesota.

In 1996, MCSS became licensed by the Minnesota Office of Higher Education, pursuant to Minnesota Statutes, Chapter 141, as a private career school. MCSS was recognized in 1996 as an approved member of the AOBTA’s Council of Schools and Programs.

CenterPoint is the first and only school in Minnesota to offer career training in shiatsu therapy. Most of our students choose the East West Therapeutic Bodywork program, thereby gaining the most extensive training in the region.

CenterPoint is committed to maintaining national standards of excellence in massage and shiatsu therapy, and is a member of both the AMTA Council of Schools and the AOBTA Council of Schools and Programs. CenterPoint has a number of alliances with organizations and businesses including various programs within the University of Minnesota, the Park House (a clinic for HIV/AIDS), and the Medtronic Twin Cities Marathon. Currently, CenterPoint enrolls the largest number of students into the East West Therapeutic Bodywork program, thereby graduating the most extensively trained bodywork therapists in the region.

CenterPoint's GUIDING PRINCIPLE

CenterPoint’s unique vision of therapeutic bodywork education unites Asian styles with Western massage therapy. CenterPoint is dedicated to preserving and integrating the philosophies, principles and practices of these diverse therapies. Combining knowledge and skill from both massage therapy and Japanese shiatsu provides the foundation for a truly therapeutic and holistic approach.