FAQ Being Tea Teacher Training for Educators

No. This unique training program focuses on developing skills for teaching tea, and not on learning about tea ourselves as students. It’s not a course for beginners in tea, and we do not study tea in this program. We study teaching, facilitation, and space holding, with tea as the focal point for that context. Any applicant to Being Tea Teacher Training needs a strong background in tea knowledge in order to participate. (details on what that could look like are below)

For people who are interested to learn more about tea, I would suggest starting with my membership program, which provides a deep level of classes about tea.

Actually, no! You don’t have to be a working tea professional to join us. But you do need a depth of diverse knowledge and personal experience with tea. This experience might come from (in no particular order):

• Working for a tea company.
• Having a small tea business owner or start-up.
• Working for a tea shop or coffee roaster that sells and serves tea.
• Formal academic study of tea.
• Holding a Tea Sommelier, Certified Tea Specialist, or other certification.
• Being an experienced tea blogger or tea community facilitator.
• Being a devoted and studied tea enthusiast of some years.
• Other unique life experience, such as coming from a tea producing family or growing up around a lot of tea culture in your home.

Absolutely! This is highly encouraged and very welcome. Our program has attracted a wonderfully diverse community of teachers, including: small business owners; music and arts teachers; yoga teachers and bodyworkers; mindfulness teachers; writers and bloggers; people with experience in recovery spaces and mental health; university professors. Tea doesn’t have to be your job to qualify!

If you’re just starting your study with tea, Being Tea Teacher Training would not be the best fit for you just yet. This program focuses specifically on the craft of how we teach tea as educators, not learning about tea as a student. However, my membership program is a great fit for folks at this stage who are seeking continuing education support in tea.

The core of this program involves 8 months of study. While this is a rigorous and deep training, it’s also thoughtfully designed for learning around work / life schedules.

• You’ll need to attend two live online classes each month, 2-hours each. These happen on the same day + time each month.
• You’ll also have four video lectures each month to view on your own time, about 3-4 hours total.
• That’s approximately 7-8 hours of instruction time (video + live online) each month.
• There’s also light writing homework, journaling, and lesson plan development with each monthly module. This takes a few hours, at most.
• You should plan for about 10-12 hours of monthly time commitment, between instructional time + homework and other writing.
• Students have one month to complete their assignments.
• Students also have 4 months after core training ends to plan and complete their practice workshop to formally graduate.

This program is offered once a year and runs September through April. The schedule for how your cohort will meet is based on the needs of the incoming group. I collect this information during the new student enrollment process. You will not be scheduled in a group that meets outside of your stated availability.

Please note that I am located in Chicago (time zone converter), and the hours I teach fall between 9am start and 7pm finish. The most commonly requested time for training tends to be Saturday mornings and Sunday afternoons.

While I do teach tea meditation myself, this program is not focused on teaching in a specific style, tradition or lineage. Being Tea Teacher Training is for channeling your own personal and professional experience with tea into creative, inclusive learning experiences for others.

So, you absolutely could feel more comfortable leading tea ceremony after this training, but only if you had already studied this art deeply yourself as a student.

When it comes to meditation work, my suggestion would be to have a strong, regular personal practice, in whatever you want to teach. If you do not have a regular meditation practice yourself right now, find a group or tradition you connect with and get started. When it comes to working with people on a mental, emotional and spiritual level – which is a vulnerable and sensitive space – it would be irresponsible to jump in without deep personal experience first.

We don’t talk about health benefits in this program, but that doesn’t mean it couldn’t still be helpful to your work.

It’s important to note that Being Tea Teacher Training is based on working with tea from the tea plant, Camellia sinensis, and not other botanicals, herbals or health teas. That’s the background I come from myself; I’m not an herbalist. Additionally, we also focus on our study on the sensory, physical, emotional and cultural interaction with tea in this program.

However, I am definitely open to applicants who are not 100% tea focused in their professional life (for example, a certified Ayurveda practitioner), as long as they have a strong background in tea in addition to their botanical study qualifications.