[2/27/03]As one of the 1,300 LPGA teaching professionals in the world and the only one in north Mississippi n Kathy Hester was already in good company. Now that she’s reached the highest level of her profession, she’s moved into an even more elite club.

Hester, the assistant pro at Clear Creek Golf Course, received her Class A teaching certification in October, becoming one of only 537 golf pros in the world to achieve that status.

“It was my goal starting out in the LPGA program, and it’s just not an easy thing to accomplish. I’m just glad I made it, and it’ll help me to further my career,” Hester said.

Hester, 50, didn’t begin playing golf until she was 26 years old. On a lark, she went out and played nine holes with a friend, and won. She’s been hooked ever since.

“From the first time I played it, I fell in love with it, and I’ve been playing it ever since,” Hester said.

After playing in amateur tournaments for about 15 years, Hester decided to turn pro. That decision led her into teaching the game, and she received her first certification from the USGA Teachers’ Federation in 1992.

“I played amateur golf for a long time, and felt like I had gone just about as far as I could go,” Hester said. “I worked on my game and studied it so much, I felt like I could teach people about this game.”

And teach she did.

After spending several years in her hometown of Monroe, La., Hester came to Clear Creek as the assistant pro last year. Along the way, she began going through the four-year certification process to become a Class A pro.

The certification involves playing, written, and teaching evaluations, and isn’t easy. It took Hester three tries to finally pass her last exam, the teaching evaluation. In that test, a group of LPGA officials watched Hester give a lesson and then graded her on it. She said that was the toughest of the three evaluations to pass.

“What you’re thinking and what they’re thinking aren’t always the same thing,” she said.

Now that she has her certification, Hester has some goals in mind. She said she enjoys working with junior players, and would like to get more young girls involved in golf.

Her own late introduction to the game has left Hester with a desire to introduce golf to a younger crowd.

“That’s why I’m into the juniors, because I didn’t have an opportunity to play when I was younger,” she said, adding that teaching any inexperienced player how to play comes with great rewards. “It’s so rewarding. You don’t know how rewarding it is to watch a person not know which end of the stick to hold, then working with them and watching them be able to get the ball off the ground and just light up.”