Recommended resources for supplementing learning?

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Hi all. I appreciate any advice or insight you have. I have worked in cannabis extraction for about 5 years doing CO2, EHO, and BHO in. In the past few years I have wanted to learn more general science (not necessarily cannabis specific) that would help supplement what we do in the lab.

I got my BS in biology years ago but often wish I could go back to school for something like chemistry or engineering. And at the time, I didn’t take school as seriously as I wish I would’ve (got my degree but it definitely was a struggle when it came to tougher courses.) As much as I would love to, right now I don’t have the time or money so I often do free online courses that I can find just to teach me basics. I’ve used edX, Alison, Khan Academy, etc. I know they are not formal/certified but anything helps. I’ve done basics of thermodynamics, electrical fundamentals, and also some business geared ones like operations management, etc).

I’d love to have as many options available as possible to us in the lab. We read any cannabinoid research we can find but sometimes I’ll also try reading engineering, crystallization, etc. papers whenever I can grasp them, even if I can only glean a bit. When paid courses are available I usually run it by the company and I’m grateful that they’ve given us the opportunity to do some.

If anyone has any recommendations or resources that helped them a lot with some basic background skills I would really appreciate it. I would love to use them myself and also offer some options to my team as well. I know this place has a lot of really talented individuals and anything that has helped you will be helpful to us.

Thanks in advance, hope this is posted in the right spot and apologies if not.

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I’d 100% ask for the OSHA 10-hr or OSHA 40-hr if your company is helping with paid courses. Its fully transferrable outside of the cannabis space, and will probably help you save someone’s life. :wink:

Other important things that are super helpful and often free.

Classes on basic economics, budgeting, and credit vehicles.
Classes on soft skills - for all those things you’ll need in management but often don’t get to learn about until its too late.

Leverage that biology and start looking at GMO related stuff - no reason you shouldn’t be able to study up on CRISPR for instance and other things related to tissue culture, chemotypes, and different chromosomal expressions in the plant.

And there’s a WHOLE other plane of regenerative and sustainable practices out there. And I mean an whole other plane of existence. With many classes that are free or subsidized by your local agriculture extension through your local university. So much to be done on the front and back ends here - where the plant comes from, how it grows, where the water comes from, where it goes, nutrients, and of course the handling of all the wastes, emissions, etc. So many free classes on this stuff and even certification programs out there. :slight_smile:

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Good ole’ Khan Academy is always a go-to for me for hard-skills!

Gonna second Cassin on the whole “Reach out to your local university ag department branch”, it’s what they’re all there for and LOVE to hear from and help out cannabis industry folks, that’s been my experience so far, makes their day compared to getting calls about corn lol

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springer handbooks and redbull

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