The cannabis industry in Illinois has seen a roughly 50% increase in revenue in the past year.
The University of Illinois Springfield is taking notice with new online cannabis education certificates. The program includes instruction in areas such as business, horticulture, law and healthcare.
Illinois is now the fourth largest cannabis job market in the country, according to the Leafly and Whitney Economics 2022 cannabis job report. UIS is partnering with Green Flower, a California based cannabis training provider.
Robert Kerr, Director of Continuing and Professional Education at UIS, believes the partnership between Green Flower and UIS makes sense.
“Green Flower works very closely with the industry. That's really why it's beneficial to partner with somebody like Green Flower,” Kerr said. “It's those industry contacts. It's really hard to kind of create those from scratch. So, Green Flower has basically already done that hard work. They've engaged with industry partners in cannabis in Illinois, but also nationwide, because they're a nationwide provider. So that helps to create the content, right? That’s step one.”
Kerr said another step of the partnership is assistance with finding industry jobs. “Step two is how do you support those graduates to get into the industry after they completed your program? Green flower has a fairly robust network of industry partners that know the quality of their graduates and Green Flower kind of connects their graduates with the industry partners to make sure that people have those opportunities,” he said.
The six month non-degree certificate programs cost $2,500 with payment plans available. Registration deadline is Sept. 9. For more information on these programs go to cannabiseducation.uis.edu.
