How to Become a Yoga Instructor in Rochester, NY
With its rolling hills, scenic waterways and proximity to the awe-inspiring Finger Lakes region, Rochester, NY, is a perfect place to get in touch with your inner yogi. As the third-largest metropolitan area in New York State, Greater Rochester also offers all the training and support you will need to become a certified yoga teacher and get your first job.
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Instructions
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Attend classes throughout the region. This will help you finesse your practice; many schools will require you to demonstrate basic yoga skills before accepting you in teacher training. It will also allow you to determine what style of yoga you would like to teach and find instructors you admire whose training you might want to emulate. Options include Absolute Yoga (absoluteyoga.org), a yoga institute with locations throughout the region that has been entrenched in the Rochester yoga community since 1977, Nirvasana Yoga (nirvasanayoga.com), which specializes in Iyengar-style yoga or Prana Yoga, (pranayogarochester.com), a Fairport studio started by a couple with a strong focus on community.
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Talk to teachers you admire about where they completed their training and other tips they can offer as you complete your journey to becoming an instructor. You might find teachers who have completed training certified by Yoga Alliance -- a nationally known institute that seeks to standardize and improve yoga training -- at schools that are registered with the organization. In Rochester, that includes Vinyasa classes at Midtown Athletic Club (www.midtown.com/rochester) and Iyengar classes at Open Sky Yoga Center (openskyyoga.com), which also offers teacher training.
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Complete a certification program. Open Sky Yoga offers a seven-month program, with five long weekends and one, four-day intensive series, focusing on yoga techniques, philosophy and teaching practice and enables students to apply their 200 hours of training toward Yoga Alliance registry. Kundalini Yoga (kundaliniyoga-sdsk.com) offers a 10-week course, which also meets the requirements for a 200-hour Yoga Alliance registration, in a traditional eastern practice focused on meditation and kinetic energy. Breathe Yoga (breatheyoga.com), in Pittsford and Webster, offers 200-hour Yoga Alliance-registered teacher training classes in modern complexes that have juice bars, spa services and retail stores.
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Tips & Warnings
Consider supplementing your yoga teacher certification with CPR certification. At least one job available in the Rochester area in 2011 required CPR certification. Regardless of whether it helps you get a job, the training you receive could give you the confidence that you will be able to help your future students if they do have a medical issue during class.
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