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PART 2
INTERMEDIATE

BACK

TO SCHOOL

If you look around you will notice that specialty coffee shops are booming
nowadays, clearly they also have students as employees, but let’s face the fact: you
cannot build a business without qualified staff. You and I might be able to say what
we like about coffee, but could we say more, by identifying everything that makes a
cup good or bad? And that precious practical knowledge is what we can gain in schools
all around the world, we just need to chose suitable program.
Barista and Roaster Compensation Report made by SCAA in 2014 one more
time proved that education helps people make their lives better (and it is still so in
2017). Salary survey shows that there is a strong link between certification and better
pay; certified barista earns $240 more per year compared to a non-certified one,
certified roasters have a similar success to share, which is earning 6% more on average
that non-certified counterparts. There also exists a strong correlation between an
education level and career opportunities, such as management and training positions.
In order to analyze the education market, we chose 5 coffee schools from
different parts of the world and talked to them about their experience. Noticing
the importance of being a part of international acknowledged coffee education
system, most schools we interviewed offer all (in general) of the SCAE/SCA.
Coffee Diploma System modules (Barista Skills, Brewing, Green Coffee, Roasting,
and Sensory Skills). However, due to different background, environment and
consumers’ demand, their specialization also differs.

Australia
Australia and New Zealand

In Australia and New Zealand, coffee has always been a part of leisure time New
and relaxed beach-centric lifestyle, so people are expecting better quality drinks,
which create a demand for more qualified baristas. “We trained over 400 people last Zealand
year, and approximately 95% of the students learnt Barista skills,” said Simon James
from Genovese Coffee, a 3rd generation family business in Melbourne. Thus, one of
the most popular courses in Australia is basic barista skills, also there is a growing
demand for SCAE/SCAA training programs, learning coffee roasting and sensory
skills, brewing courses are also popular due to the growth of brewed coffee market.
What’s more, Genovese Coffee is also the only facility offering certified training for
all aspects of the coffee industry in Australia.

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