Continuing Education, the time is Now!
Continuing Education, the time is Now! |
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In compliance with state legislation which made North Carolina the 47th state to mandate continuing education for real estate licensees, the Commission has finalized rules for implementation of its continuing education program. The basic requirement is eight (8) classroom hours of Commission-approved continuing education per year to renew a license on active status.
You must obtain four (4) of the required eight (8) classroom hours each year by completing the Commission's Real Estate Update course. You may obtain the remaining four (4) hours of the required eight (8) classroom hours by completing one or more elective courses approved by the Commission.
The education must be completed within the twelve-month period immediately preceding license expiration on June 30. (Sponsors will not be allowed to offer approved courses between June I I and June 30 of any year.) Therefore, in order to renew on active status next June, you must obtain the required continuing education before June 10, 1995. Now is the time to make your plans for meeting the requirement.
Course Availability, Fees, and Schedules
Course sponsors are currently seeking Commission approval of their courses and planning their schedules. Eventually, there should be hundreds of continuing education course sponsors and several hundred courses throughout the state. Course and sponsor approval will be a gradual process, however, so the Commission requests your patience during the next few months.
The first approved courses are expected to be available in late August or early September of 1994.
The number should then steadily increase throughout the fall and winter, and there should be courses available within a reasonable driving distance for all licensees.
Approved continuing education sponsors will market their courses through direct mailings to licensees and by other means. In addition, each future edition of the Real Estate Bulletin will include addresses and phone numbers of approved sponsors. Course schedules, listed alphabetically by city, will be published for the upcoming 3-4 months from information that will be provided to the Commission by course sponsors. All real estate firms and boards of REALTORS® are urged to post these schedules on their bulletin boards and to remind licensees of this information at their meetings. Please contact the sponsors if you wish to verify schedules or for information on fees and registration.
All approved continuing education courses will be open to all licensees on a first-come/first-served basis ' even if the sponsor is a trade association or a real estate firm or franchise. However, the association/firm/franchise may charge a higher course registration fee to a licensee who is not affiliated with the sponsor than to one who is affiliated.
Although sponsors are allowed to set their own registration fees, it is expected that competition among sponsors will keep fees at a reasonable level. However, you may wish to compare costs if you have a choice of several courses in your area. The fact that the fees charged for courses near the end of the annual license period may be higher than those charged for the same courses that are conducted earlier in the period is an added incentive to obtain your continuing education credit as early as possible. Each Bulletin will also feature another article in the series on continuing education, to keep you updated on the program and to address your questions and concerns.
The purpose of the article in this edition is to give an overview of the program and to highlight and restate particularly important aspects which were discussed in detail in the last Bulletin. [See Real Estate Bulletin, Vol. 24, No. 4 (Winter 1994).]
Active vs. Inactive
If you are one of the many real estate licensees who will NOT be actively engaged in real estate practice, you may renew your license on inactive status without satisfying the continuing education requirement. Inactive status means you may not engage in any real estate activity that requires a license, including a referral for which you will receive compensation, not even on an occasional basis.
You may retain your license on inactive status indefinitely and you will not have to satisfy the continuing education requirement as long as your license remains inactive. However, in order to change your license from inactive status to active status, you must show that you have obtained continuing education specified by the Commission. The specified amount could range from 0 to 20 hours, depending on the length of time your license has been inactive, any continuing education you may have completed since the beginning of the preceding license period, and whether such education is creditable toward the continuing education requirement for the current license period.
Some licensees who are not actively engaged in real estate brokerage may ask, "Why not let my license expire and just reinstate it later if I need it?"
The reason is that the requirements to reinstate a license that has been expired for more than one year will be considerably more stringent than the requirements to activate a license that has been inactive for more than one year. The Real Estate Commission is authorized to hold applicants for reinstatement of a license that has been expired for over a year to the same requirements - including the license examination - as applicants for original licensure!
Because only active licensees are required to satisfy the continuing education requirement as a condition of license renewal, you must indicate whether you are renewing your license on active status or inactive status beginning with license renewal in June 1995. Active status is required if you wish to engage in any real estate activity requiring a license, including a referral for which you will receive compensation.
If you plan to renew your license on active status, you must obtain four (4) of the required eight (8) classroom hours each year by completing the Commission's Real Estate Update course.
Update Course
The four-hour Update course will be available through sponsors and instructors who have been approved by the Commission. It is expected that sponsors will include community colleges, private schools, private individuals, the North Carolina Association of REALTORS® and various local boards of REALTORS®.
The course will address recent changes in real estate related laws and practices and topics determined by the Commission to be special problem areas. The Commission will completely change the subject matter for the course annually, so each year's Update course will be different.
The 1994 - 95 Real Estate Update course will cover the following topics:
Elective Courses
You may obtain the remaining four (4) hours of the required eight (8) classroom hours by completing one or more elective courses approved by the Commission and available through sponsors and instructors who also have been approved by the Commission. Each elective course must be at least two (2) hours in length. (Note that a maximum of four hours credit will be awarded for any single elective course even if the course exceeds four hours.)
All elective courses must address a real estate topic that directly contributes to the goal of ensuring that licensees possess the knowledge, skill and competence necessary to function in the real estate business in a manner that protects and serves the public interest.
Acceptable topics include: real estate law; agency law; real estate contracts; land use controls; environmental hazards and protection; real estate economics and markets; real estate finance, investment or appraisal; property management; construction; commercial brokerage; and similar topics.
Unacceptable topics include those not directly related to real estate practice (e.g., general business administration or management or personal skills training) and those where the primary focus is on improving the licensee's ability to be financially successful (e.g., sales, motivational or success training and brokerage management).
Requirement for Nonresidents
Because many nonresident licensees may find it difficult and costly to come to North Carolina to take the Update course, they may fully satisfy the continuing education requirement by completing eight hours in elective courses approved for continuing education credit by the real estate licensing agency in their resident state.
Attendance Requirement
Licensees must attend at least 90% of the scheduled classroom hours for a course in order to receive credit. Even if an elective course exceeds four hours in length, the 90% attendance requirement must still be satisfied. For example, if an approved elective course is scheduled for 15 hours, you must attend at least 131/2 hours in order to receive any continuing education credit. Sponsors and instructors are prohibited from making any exceptions to the 90% attendance requirement. Therefore, it is important that you be on time for a scheduled continuing education course and that you not leave early or take extended breaks.
Your cooperation in assuring compliance with the attendance requirement will be appreciated. Attendance abuse can not be tolerated if we are to have an effective and respected continuing education program.
Student Participation Standards
One of the harshest criticisms of mandatory continuing education programs in the various professions has come where students are allowed to completely ignore the instruction being presented and still get credit for the course. The Commission's rules require that licensee-students be attentive to the continuing education instruction, and prohibit distractive or disruptive conduct such as sleeping, reading books and newspapers, talking to classmates or on cellular phones, and performing office or personal work during class. Students must also comply with instructions related to providing information needed to properly report completion of a course.
Sponsors and instructors are required to enforce these standards. Instructors are authorized to dismiss students who are in violation or to report their conduct to the Commission which can deny continuing education credit for such violations.
Reporting Credit to the Commission
To receive credit for a continuing education course, you must provide the course sponsor/instructor with your real estate license number at registration or when you check in for the course, so be sure to take your license "pocket card" with you.
The sponsor/instructor will give you a course completion report form, which will include an evaluation section for your use in rating the course and instructor at the end of the course. Please take the time to complete it carefully. Your evaluation will assist the Commission in ensuring high quality courses.
This course completion report for each licensee-student will be promptly submitted to the Commission following the course by the course sponsor and will be used by the Commission to credit the licensee's computer record after being checked against the class roster also submitted by the sponsor.
Within 15 days after the course, sponsors also must provide each licensee who completed the course with a course completion certificate. This certificate is the licensee's personal record of course completion. It should NOT be submitted to the Commission unless the Commission specifically requests it.
Equivalent Credit
It is sometimes possible, under very special circumstances, for a licensee to request elective course credit for a course not approved by the Commission or for some real estate education activity such as developing an elective course or writing a text or scholarly article. Detailed information is necessary for Commission evaluation, and a $50 nonrefundable evaluation fee is required. Credit will be awarded only if the course or activity is found to be equivalent to the elective course component.
Instructors of either the Update course or an approved elective course may receive credit for teaching such course and are not subject to the evaluation fee.
Licensees requesting equivalent credit should do so as far in advance of license expiration as possible to allow the Commission ample time to process the request and to allow time for the licensee to complete an approved elective course prior to license expiration if the request is denied. Any request for equivalent credit must be received by April 30.
Carry-Over Credit
The carrying over of continuing education elective course credit from one year to the next is permitted only on a very limited basis. When a licensee completes an "extra" elective course that is not needed to satisfy the elective requirement for the current license period, the credit hours earned in the "extra" course may be carried over to satisfy the elective requirement for the next license period.
The Commission automatically will credit the licensee's extra course to the next license period. No special request by the licensee is necessary. However, please understand that only entire courses of at least two classroom hours qualify for carry-over credit. Extra hours in a single course may not be carried over.
Extensions of Time
In cases of extreme hardship, the Commission may grant additional time for you to complete your continuing education. But to receive this additional time, you must show that you were unable to obtain the retired continuing education due to an incapacitating illness or other circumstance which existed for a substantial portion of the license year. You must show that satisfying the continuing education requirement prior to license renewal would therefore have caused you a severe and verifiable hardship. Business or personal inconvenience and your procrastination in taking courses are not grounds for an extension. The fact that you may be forced to go on inactive status until you have obtained your continuing education will not be considered a hardship. A last minute emergency will not entitle you to an extension of time where you had most of the license year to obtain the required education.
Penalty for Noncompliance
If you have not fully satisfied the continuing education requirement as of June 30 of any year, your license will be automatically converted to inactive status effective the next day (July 1) and you must immediately cease all real estate brokerage activity until your license has been returned to active status.
Any licensee who continues to engage in real estate brokerage after his or her license has been placed on inactive status will be subject to disciplinary action. In addition, the licensee's broker-in-charge will also be subject to disciplinary action for failure to determine that all licensees at the office have current, active licenses.
Your early compliance with the continuing education requirement will help the Commission to have a successful continuing education program - one which will benefit licensees as well as real estate consumers.