Cannabis Education Gets Here (Virtually) At More American Universities

At first glimpse, they don’t seem to have much in typical: college administrators looking for new revenue sources because their students have actually all gone home, and displaced workers looking into the legal cannabis market because it’s still employing throughout the pandemic. Five universities (with more in the pipeline) are working with Green Flower Media to offer coursework on growing, testing and selling legal marijuana.

Max Simon, Green Flower Media’s founder wasn’t getting much traction pitching cannabis-related online course content to American universities in2019 The Coronavirus hit, and colleges started rotating as fast as they might to online education, consisting of not-for-credit “continuing education” offerings that could help re-train workers and include earnings to college coffers.

At the same time, marijuana production and sales were deemed “vital” services throughout the pandemic and enabled to stay open by the states where it was legal for medical or leisure functions.

By March, interest in Green Flower Media certificates focusing on marijuana service practices, medical applications, laws/compliance, and horticulture/agriculture, “delved into high equipment,” stated Simon. In the next few months, Florida Atlantic University, Northern Michigan University, a California state university (to be revealed later on,) Mount Aloysius College and the University of San Diego will begin offering the education certificates.

Each of the four marijuana certificate types include 3 courses that are delivered over two months and cost $3000 The 405 hours of tasks and “class” time consist of one 3rd videos and readings, with the rest is divided between research study, research, and internships when possible. For each friend of 25 trainees, a facilitator helps with online forums and review projects.

There is demand for well-trained employees in the cannabis market according to Dr. Steve VandenAvond, Northern Michigan University’ vice president for extended knowing and community, because it requires extremely specialized understanding and abilities in a variety of areas.

Master growers who comprehend how to raise high quality plants on a big scale are really much in need he stated. Store supervisors require to understand and comply with an extra set of financial and security guidelines related to marijuana sales.

Northern Michigan University, one of Green Flower’s brand-new partners, has actually been offering a for-credit course, Medicinal Plant Chemistry, consisting of details on THC extraction and screening of cannabis plants, since2017 Hundreds looked for the first class, surprising the university, and the course has remained popular.

Right after the class introduced, the university started getting student queries about marijuana coursework beyond the hard sciences. Medical marijuana has actually been legal in the state given that 2008 through the Michigan Compassionate Care Initiative, and sales of adult leisure use marijuana items started in December 2019.

Steve VandenAvond chose Green Flower to supply a set of not-for-credit online courses to offer this summer season. “We have a long history of engaging with the community and offering what the labor force wants,” VandenAvond said. These classes were “a natural next step,” at school in a relatively rural part of Michigan’s upper peninsula. Marijuana jobs there have been considered vital in the pandemic.

” There’s a need for experienced employees and these courses do an excellent job mixing lectures, quizzes and other multimedias aspects,” stated VandenAvond.

Green Flower has connections with regional employers to help discover internships and full-time work for its students.

Simon thinks this year will be a turning point in education when colleges “will see cannabis as a legitimate market and marijuana education as a legitimate student education area.”

Seeking to the future, Simon plans to broaden the curriculum, and is already dealing with a Cannabis Lawbreaker Justice certificate. He likewise intends to sign more schools on– he said is in discussions with thirty other institutions.