its not about the systems or the technical flying, its about building some experience in an airplane, (granted not a real big airplane) but none the less you learn so much from flight instructing. And the reason most people fail out of 121 training is lack of IFR skills, and teaching instruments really make your instrument skills better, beeing able to talk through an instrument approach while your looking outside and talking your student through his scan really helps. At least it did for me, but hey, i didnt get a chance to fly a crj sim in college, but I made it through training fine and i guarantee you my student loan payments are 1/3 of any UND grad or Purduebee. So yess, I believe flight instructing for a year, is MORE valuable than one hour of training in a CRJ sim before your ready to fly something like that anyways.