Long Beach City College has made the groundbreaking decision to offer its first cannabis course this fall.
Focussed on the ins and outs of the cannabis business, the course will explore numerous topics related to the industry, including the history, licensing, laws and regulations relevant to Long Beach specifically, as well as each one of the elements in the supply chain, such as retail, distribution, testing labs, manufacturing, and cultivation.
According to Dr. Kathy Scott, LBCC’s executive vice president of academic affairs, the course is not yet open for enrollment, but there is currently an interest list of over 400 people.
At a cost of $395 for a twice-a-week, eight-week class, this pass/no-pass course will be not for credit and does not qualify for federal financial aid, but is part of LBCC’s latest installment in industry-driven vocational training, providing students who pass the course with a certificate of completion. The curriculum is still in the finishing stages of its developing process, but is set to begin at the end of September.
Scott explained that the course will offer students “a good overview of what’s involved in this industry- the regulations, the licenses, how different groups interact, whether it’s the cultivators, the growers, the distributions, the customer service, the dispensaries . . . so if people have that interest and think they may want to work in the industry, it’s a good overview.”
According to Dr. Scott, the process of creating and implementing the course took a few months following the legalization of recreational cannabis use in California, involving detailed research into similar existing programs, and the ultimate consensus that there is an educational component lacking in the industry currently. “It’s not a typical course,” Scott said, “It’s the type of course that is developed with industry request and is taught by industry rather than LBCC faculty, and the curriculum is designed to meet the needs of the industry.
Joe Rogoway, an attorney in the cannabis field will be the course’s lead instructor. Rogoway has had his own law practice for nearly ten years representing cannabis companies and has also been involved in the political sphere regarding the legalization of cannabis. “This sort of fusion with cannabis and social justice and political change is really what’s guided my entire professional career, and to be able to utilize all of the experience doing that type of work to bring to LBCC to start your very first cannabis education program was just a really exciting opportunity, and I’m eager to be a part of it,” Rogoway said.
Rogoway explained that while most other industries have formalized vocational training to acquire the necessary skills to enter the workforce, there “is a huge unmet need in the cannabis industry. There have been some private institutions that have done a good job in the initial versions of what this education can look like, but there haven’t really been any schools that are more kind of formalized institutions that have been really willing to take on cannabis in the same way.”
Continued Rogoway, “Why LBCC and why Long Beach? Because Long Beach is awesome. LBCC is a great school, a lot of good people working there, a lot of innovation, it’s culturally appropriate, it’s professional, it’s all of the things that go into the mix to have a successful program.”
As for why so few schools have been willing to introduce similar courses into their curriculums, Rogoway considered stigma, “based on years of propaganda and misinformation and indoctrination, often racially tinged,” to be a key factor. Since recreational legalization in 2016, Rogoway considers California to have shifted towards a more casual attitude than in other parts of the country. “I think it’s taken a while for the issue to become sufficiently mainstream that there’s broader acceptance, but there still is bias that has been created from decades of the War on Drugs that takes a while to reprogram them, and Long Beach just happened to deprogram first.”
Said Rogoway, “When I was growing up in the area in the ‘90s, it still was stigmatized. Even when I was in law school working at Americans for Safe Access and I would come back home and talk to family members about what I was doing, people thought I was crazy. I would get responses like ‘why are you wasting your life?’ and fast forward to the current era, where the same people ask me which cannabis companies they should be investing in. It has changed significantly in that it is normalized. I don’t want to overstate a stigma, but in reference to why other educational institutions don’t have this program, it could be not just stigma, and it could be that they don’t have the insight to see the benefits for the community because they are not aware of the issues and the market and the demand and the need for these types of educational services.”
Despite any existing stigma that may still exist, according to Scott, throughout the process of creating the course, there was little to no pushback to the program. “There were a few concerns or questions raised about why we do this. The reason is we’re very closely connected in Long Beach, and the city has a role in looking at this industry and for helping businesses in the city of Long Beach, so we’re trying to provide a service.”
Said Scott, potential concerns were raised regarding students who receive federal financial aid, possible issues for international students, and for minors as well. “There’s certain legal issues that we need to be mindful of and looking out for our students and anybody who may enroll,” Scott said, explaining that students interested in the course should be aware of these potential risks, and LBCC would advise them on the best course of action regarding the course.
The cannabis industry is unique in many aspects, according to Rogoway, due to its many regulations and political elements. The course will help students better understand these connections, as well as better prepare students to work for an existing business or even begin their own. Both Rogoway and Scott acknowledged the possibility of an expansion of this program in the future, possibly allowing for more in-depth courses focussing on specific specialities.
As for this fall, said Rogowsay, “My ultimate goal is to make sure we’re providing good quality instruction to LBCC students. Anything else that happens is really just a bonus, this class is the very first one, so I want to make sure we do a great job for everybody, and give them meaningful knowledge that they can use professionally, and if it’s successful, we’ll see where it takes us.”