Explaining the difference between a hefeweizen and a Belgian witbier just got easier for Bethany Smith, Brand Ambassador and Sales at Craft & Compass, a beverage marketing agency in Kelowna.
She is one of 15 Canadians awarded a scholarship through the Cicerone® Certification Program and the Canadian Brewing Awards Second Annual National Beer Scholarship program. The scholarships help Canadians begin their beer journey with Cicerone—a global certification program that puts beer professionals to the test.
Over 100 professionals who serve or brew beer for a living applied for the scholarship. Smith won BeerSavvy® Online, an eLearning course that prepares her to write the Certified Beer Server Exam. And that’s important, considering her goal.
“While I currently work in retail and education, my long-term goal is to own a craft brewery,” she says. “I believe that one of the many steps to achieving that goal is to increase my beer expertise in any way possible. Cicerone is an industry recognized certification that could open more doors for me as I work toward opening a brewery.”
The B.C. Craft Brewers Guild had the task of choosing the provincial winner.
Should Smith pass her Certified Beer Server exam she will join over 100,000 around the world who have achieved certification since the program’s launch in 2008. The Cicerone Certification Program is built around a series of four professional certification exams starting with Certified Beer Server and ending with the top-level Master Cicerone.
