When I was in college, beer wasn’t consumed for educational purposes. But now it seems like things have changed, the University of North Carolina at Charlotte is offering a Craft Beer Business Essentials certificate program. The program features an accelerated curriculum, targeted at homebrewers and entrepreneurs, emphasizing industry networking and business basics in the ever-growing craft beer world.
The program is made up of four courses: Legal Bootcamp for Craft Beer Business, Creating and Financing Your Business Plan, Identity Development and Marketing Strategies and Brewery Management Fundamentals. If you’re still brewing in your bathtub, it might be time to take your beer smarts to a more collegiate level.
Men’s Journal reports that the non-credit continuing education program takes place over seven weeks and is open to anyone who signs up online. Students will learn about the (probably less fun) elements of running a craft beer business, like the legal issues that come with being a licensed brewer.
If you’re not ready to commit to a whole program (or don’t want to sit through business lectures), UNC also runs a Saturday course called Beer Basics: Crash Course in Craft that’s perfect for beer enthusiasts. The class is advertised as fun, interactive, and educational, and is designed for professional development or personal enrichment.
UNC isn’t the only school jumping onto the craft beer movement. Southern Illinois University Edwardsville is also offering non-credit courses for microbrewers and connoisseurs. The courses are a mix of online work and in-person labs, covering everything from the history of brewing to the sensory analysis of brewing products.
The University of Cincinnati offers a community class dubbed “Grain to Glass: An Introduction to Home-Brewing,” a four-week workshop that teaches the different parts of the brewing process from a local brewery founder. Students will learn how to select the right yeast, gain an understanding of materials and ingredients, and learn how to drink and evaluate different brews.
Whether you need marketing tips or just want to learn how your favorite beer is made, knowledge is power — and we all know that beer is good.
