Recommended Courses?

Hi All,

I thought I'd put up a post to see if anyone has taken, or knows of any courses or further education for existing brewers looking to further educate? I've been looking around but everything seems kind of limited; courses are either the basics of brewing, or they're 1-2 year diplomas. I'm curious if anyone knows of something 'in between'.... Short courses (1-2 weeks kind of deal), either on-campus or online, or even handy webinars!

Any information would be awesome!


Avery

I did the IDB general cert in brewing and packaging, which is prob a little too basic if you already work at a brewery. After that I did what Siebel now calls the "Advanced brewing Theory" course. It's the Theory portion of their full course. So you do all the in class stuff minus the going to europe and brewing/touring around portion. Its pretty intense 6 weeks in class, but can be done online over the course of 9 months.

They also have a shorter, 2 week course in class, which i believe is called the concise course, but that is more ment as a basics as well.

Shoot me an email if you have some questions. kevin @ blockthreebrewing.ca

Thanks for the input! I took the Concise Course in Brewing Technology over a year ago before starting at the brewery here, and it was a solidly intense 3-month online course. Seems to be a well-known course for starting out. I looked up the Advanced Course you mentioned, and it seems like a step up, for sure. So you did the 6-week campus course?

Sorry, that was a little confusing. I did it online. I was working at wellington at the time so couldn't take six weeks off, but it was an easy pace for somebody working 50hr weeks.

I found some of the more intense chemistry and o-chem pretty difficult cause I had no science background, but there are a lot of resources to help out. Made some good friends from all over as well.

I took the Siebel Concise Course in Brewing Technology in class at the Chicago location. 2 weeks, intense classwork. Covers the basics and gets into a bit of depth on the brewing specifics. I don't think there is a good course out there that gets into the nitty gritty of mechanical stuff (boiler systems, glycol systems, pump types for best use, etc). Made some good friends in both the staff, instructors and students.

Two of our brewers are just back from the 6 month Brewmaster certification program at VLB in Berlin.

I would love to find something affordable to send my staff to. something less than 2weeks that isn't thousands of dollars lol. I find most of these courses are either too long or you don't get any real knowledge if you already brew commercially.

does anyone know of any good seminars that isn't OBCC? we take staff there every year because it is great to learn from. anything like that would be awesome.

Agreed with all of that, Sean... Essentially the same type of deal I'm looking for.

Whitewater Sean wrote:I would love to find something affordable to send my staff to. something less than 2weeks that isn't thousands of dollars lol. I find most of these courses are either too long or you don't get any real knowledge if you already brew commercially.

does anyone know of any good seminars that isn't OBCC? we take staff there every year because it is great to learn from. anything like that would be awesome.

Consider joining the Master Brewers Association (MBAA). They have an annual conference with multiple topics and are branching out into multiple session. Barley field day, hops field day, occasional technical sessions, discussion and Q&A forum, daily email with varying topics as well as year round webinars and access to lots of great information. Membership is individual based, not company.