By Myrna Traylor
If you know anything about the importance of providing high-quality education for prospective and current CRS Designees, you know that it is something that RRC takes seriously and is justifiably proud of. RRC courses prepare agents to deliver the best service to buyers and sellers and offer invaluable guidance for agents to thrive in their business. Not only is course content rigorously vetted to provide a baseline of proven practices, but instructors must meet high standards, as well.
You can’t just walk in off the street and teach a CRS course: You have to audition.
Making the leap
Addie Owens, CRS, decided she wanted to become a CRS certified instructor after having taught for years in her own brokerage, Touchstone Real Estate in Mount Dora, Florida. She enjoyed giving newer agents tools for becoming successful entrepreneurs and helping them find the best options for pricing and marketing. Owens says that when the opportunity to apply to become a CRS certified instructor arose, she was eager to see if she could join the ranks. “I have nothing but admiration for the other instructors on the roster,” Owens says. “Being able to teach for the Residential Real Estate Council is an incredible privilege.”
For Nate Johnson, CRS, with Redkey Realty Leaders in St. Louis, Missouri, the journey to becoming an instructor for RRC was, as he says, “kind of an accident.” Years ago, the education director for the St. Louis Association of REALTORS® asked Johnson to be the lead instructor for the new member orientation. One thing led to another, and soon he was teaching continuing education classes, at first locally, then at the state level and around the country. Despite that firm foundation in instruction, Johnson says taking the steps toward becoming a CRS certified instructor “was quite an intimidating experience. I felt like I was auditioning to be on American Idol.”
“I flew to Chicago to attend a day of training and to have an official audition the next morning in front of the RRC brass,” recalls Johnson. “I was literally in a room where it was just me and the 10 people who were judging me on my content, my delivery and all those other components of being an instructor. After I did that, I received the news a couple of weeks later—‘You’ve passed the first stage. You’ve gotten through the audition, and we think that you would make an excellent instructor.’”
Maurice Taylor, CRS, with Coldwell Banker RPM Group in North Little Rock, Arkansas, had years of experience teaching in his own real estate school before making the leap to being CRS certified. “My friend, Mark Given, CRS, came to Arkansas to teach a Military Relocation Professional class, and I was so impressed. I said, ‘Mark, I teach real estate classes, but how can I do what you do the way you do it?’” Given helped Taylor make the right connections and he entered the instructor program.
Taylor says the training/evaluation process isn’t truly grueling, but there are many core competencies that one is expected to master. “If you’re not able to engage the class, keep the material interesting and moving forward, you will never ever be able to be a CRS certified instructor,” he says. But even before it ends, instructor candidates get something valuable out of the process. “The workshop that we did was really memorable because there’s about 100 of us in that room,” recalls Taylor, “and the tips and knowledge that you get from that workshop really help you be a better instructor or presenter, whether you’re going to be a CRS certified instructor or not.”
What’s in store?
Now that they have made the cut, these newly minted instructors will soon be added to the Education lineup. All three new instructors are slated to teach Seven Things That Successful Agents Do Differently. Taylor will also be taking on Mastering Your Time to Achieve Your Goals, and Owens will be tackling Short Sales and Foreclosures: Protecting Your Clients Interests.
Owens is all in when it comes to engaging with class members. “The conversation is robust. That’s why I like teaching these courses—especially when you’ve got designees in the audience because they’re experienced, and I often find myself learning tips and tricks from them as much as they’re learning from me. It’s a fair trade.”
“I am so looking forward to it,” Taylor says. “When you are teaching a CRS candidate or Designee, they’re yearning to be better at their craft. When you can give them information they can apply to their business, to make them better at their business, at life and everything that they do, there’s no feeling that’s more gratifying than that. Helping people be better is just fantastic.”
Learn more about the RRC instructors at CRS.com/learn/faculty.
Photo: iStock.com/fstop123
