With the cannabis industry expanding and becoming more complex by the day, it’s important that those going into the field be fully knowledgeable of its full breadth. After all, it is the fastest growing industry in the U.S., according to Markets Insider.
Thankfully, there are some institutions of higher learning that are getting in real deep on the business of bud.
Like, so deep. So very deep.
And, given that so many of us are rethinking how we work, live, and play, this could be a great time to carve out a new career path in good old cannabis. Here are two options for expanding your mind and learning more about cannabis.
Conquer the field of cannabis control with a graduate certificate program from Excelsior College
Excelsior College, a regionally accredited, not-for-profit online college, offers a virtual graduate certificate program in cannabis control—which you can enroll in to further your career or just learn a heck of a lot more about cannabis. (Or maybe even become a weed professor. Is that a thing? If so, we want in.)
What is a cannabis control program, you ask? Glad you asked! This threecourse, nine-credit certificate offers an educational opportunity to people currently working or looking to work in the cannabis industry.
Excelsior’s certificate program educates students on the “opportunities, challenges, and complexities of the
cannabis industry and its accompanying regulations.” Students will learn the impact of cannabis legalization on a local, state, and national level.
Instructors hope to prepare students to eventually dialogue and work with policymakers, industry leaders, proprietors, etc as far as the cannabis market is considered.
Before jumping in, here are a few things you should know about the program:
The program is 100% online.
The three courses include:
— Implications of Legalization of Cannabis: Policy and Compliance
— Interstate/International Commerce: Policy and Regulatory Environment
— Risk Assessment in Cannabis Control
Admission to Excelsior’s cannabis control certificate program requires students to have a bachelor’s degree. This graduate-level certificate program takes an interdisciplinary approach and can be taken alone for college credit and career advancement or applied toward four of Excelsior College’s master’s degree programs.
“The more we talk to experts and leaders in the industry, the more we are hearing about the need for education and training in this dynamic and rapidly- evolving regulatory space. Despite projections of continued growth, regionally-accredited universities and colleges have been relatively slow to respond with educational offerings,”Scott Dolan, dean of graduate studies at Excelsior College, told Benzinga. “For us, this program is naturally aligned with our disciplinary expertise in business, public health, criminal justice, and public administration.”
Get your weed degree on with the Cannabis Training University’s two- and four-year degree programs
For those of you still teetering on the fence of what you’d like to do with your life, if going back to school is an option for you, well, now there’s weed university. Well…to be more exact there’s Cannabis Training University.
According to Westword, the school’s training is now offered at two and four-year universities across the United States. The expansion of the program is due to the quickly growing cannabis industry.
“We saw there was going to be a need in education in colleges where the cannabis-industry education can also be included,” CTU CEO Jeff Zorn said to Westword. “Students sign up because they usually want to be involved in the industry after college, whether it’s to be an assistant grower or start their own business in areas like CBD or edibles.”
If you do find yourself signing up for CTU classes, you can take six classes all geared toward the green (that’s cannabis for those of you who didn’t get it).
You’ll learn about the industry from a holistic standpoint, from opening a dispensary to growing your own plants. Once you pass, you will be officially certified in various parts of the industry.
Zorn started CTU ten years ago after he suffered a traumatic brain injury. He began using medical marijuana to help him cope and decided he wanted to be part of the education aspect of the cannabis industry. CTU has enrolled 30,000 students, Zorn told Westword.
“We have a lot of people interested, whether it’s students wanting to be in the industry, people interested for their own personal reasons, or health-care professionals looking for further knowledge,” Zorn said. “Our job is to just put everything together for students and have colleges offer it for them.”
