Inspection Certification Associates would like to request that the following rule regarding the qualifications for home inspector licensure be reviewed and revised during this period of General Review:

18VAC15-40-32. Qualifications for licensure.

B. Prelicense education courses must be approved by the board pursuant to Part VI (18VAC15-40-120 et seq.) of this chapter. No more than half of the required hours may be completed using distance or online education technology.

It is our belief that applicants for a home inspector license in Virginia can successfully complete the live portion of their prelicense education course contact hours via synchronous distance learning. As a result, we believe 18VAC15-40-32.(B) should be rewritten to following effect:

“Prelicense education courses must be approved by the board pursuant to Part VI (18VAC15-40-120 et seq.) of this chapter. No more than half of the required hours may be completed using asynchronous distance or online education technology. The remaining required hours must be completed via synchronous learning which includes online webinar technology.”

During the pandemic, completion of the live classroom hours via webinar was a forced necessity to prevent the spread of the virus. However, an unexpected benefit of this situation was the great success of our prelicense students who attended our synchronous online webinars. We believe the cause of this success was due to many factors, including:

• Students can attend class from the comfort of their own homes without incurring travel expenses such as mileage, meal, and hotel costs.
• Without the distractions of a new environment, students are more focused on the instructor and the material at hand, while the instructor can remain focused on imparting knowledge.
• Tuition is more affordable as the live, classroom costs have been removed, making the course more accessible to a wider range of students.
• Students have a unique opportunity to engage with other students outside of their community and learn from each other’s experience in different parts of the state.
• Student accommodations can be made much more easily without incurring extra costs as make-up days can be quickly scheduled in another webinar.
• Students have immediate access to their residence and can see first-hand many of the inspection items being discussed during class.