| The California Department of Real Estate (DRE) Commissioner encourages educational research on real estate curriculum that was designed based on 1950s California legislation. In 1997, Research Vice President for the California Association of Realtors® (CAR) identified industry changes for higher productivity of agents. El Camino College (ECC) real estate student body includes educated individuals needing retraining, retired mature re-entry students seeking different careers, and unskilled adults including students from the Job Training Partnership Act, Welfare-to-Work, and Workplace 2000 programs, who expect employment. The Chancellor's office Educational Master Plan submitted by El Camino College (ECC) in 1998 included curriculum changes to meet student needs and employer demands.; The purposes of this study were to determine what skills local Association of Realtor® members need from an entry-level real estate assistant, and to use the data collected to design an appropriate curriculum for El Camino College.; Descriptive quantitative methods were used to determine the recommendations of a selected population of real estate agents from the South Bay Association of Realtors® for the entry-level skills for a real estate assistant. The data were filtered by zip codes (local to El Camino College), active DRE license status. and employer use or interest in hiring entry-level real estate assistants. A panel of experts that included the 1996 and 1998 college real estate department advisory committees and the 1998 business division faculty validated the study. In 1997, personnel from the California (DRE), the Office of Real Estate Appraisal, and the California Real Estate Education Association were consulted.; The investigator found that more than 60% of respondents want the real estate assistant to be licensed, more than 80% of agents would hire a real estate assistant, over 70% of the agents in the firms already use an assistant, and more than 85% of the firms have no training available for the assistant. Based on the data collected, recommendations for revisions can be made to real estate curriculum at El Camino College. |
