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Education & Certification Committee — Charter

Status: Draft, pre-formation. Adopted by board motion at or shortly after incorporation.

Purpose

To steward the Guild's educational substance and the integrity of its certification framework: curriculum, continuing education (CE), exam policy, educator vetting, and the credential's standards. The committee is the place where the Guild's professional rigor lives.

Authority

  • Recommends to the board: certification framework changes, exam policy, CE requirements, educator vetting criteria, and the curriculum roadmap
  • Approves directly (under board-delegated authority): individual educator-member applications, CE-credit approvals for third-party courses, and routine curriculum updates within the approved framework
  • Oversees exam-development and exam-integrity processes; engages psychometric or exam-development expertise as needed
  • Does not issue individual credentials (the Administrator does so once eligibility is confirmed) or set tuition for paid programs (that is operations + Audit & Finance)

Composition

  • 3 to 7 members
  • Chair is a director; ideally a credentialed Ganjier or experienced cannabis educator
  • At least two credentialed Ganjiers (CG or equivalent) for practitioner anchoring
  • At least one member with documented education-design or assessment expertise (instructional designer, psychometrician, or comparable) — paid consultant if necessary
  • Term: members 2 years, staggered, renewable once
  • Administrator is non-voting staff support

Cadence

  • Monthly in launch year while curriculum and exam framework stabilize
  • Quarterly thereafter
  • Always meets in February (annual CE review), August (educator vetting refresh), November (curriculum roadmap for next year)

Specific responsibilities

Certification framework

  • Maintain the published standard for the Certified Ganjier (CG) credential; steward the Ganjier Product Specialist (GPS) designation as an existing credential recognized by the Guild
  • Define eligibility, exam structure, scoring, retake policy, and appeals
  • Maintain the recertification policy: 20 CE hours over 2 years, with category minimums and annual ethics attestation per membership/tiers.md
  • Recommend any new credential or specialization to the board

Curriculum

  • Maintain the curriculum roadmap and the practice-area scope (cultivation, processing, sensory, hospitality, retail, ethics)
  • Approve curriculum updates within the framework; recommend framework changes to the board
  • Coordinate with educator members to maintain currency

Exam integrity

  • Oversee exam-development cycles, item review, and item-bank maintenance
  • Maintain proctoring standards and security protocols
  • Investigate suspected exam misconduct under defined SOP; serious cases referred to the Membership & Ethics committee

Continuing education

  • Maintain CE category definitions and minimums
  • Approve third-party CE providers and individual courses for credit
  • Track member CE progress in coordination with the Administrator and the member portal
  • Manage CE-related complaints (e.g., misrepresentation of CE)

Educator vetting

  • Maintain the educator directory and speaker pipeline in coordination with the Events committee and Communications committee
  • If the board adopts an Educator Member tier, review applications per published criteria; until then, maintain an informal educator directory
  • Annual conflict-of-interest review for educators with vendor or product affiliations

Equity and access

  • Recommend scholarship-funded seats in paid programs in coordination with the Membership & Ethics committee
  • Monitor pass rates, demographics (where collected), and accessibility of materials

Decision rights

Decision Authority
Issue an individual credential Administrator (once eligibility confirmed) — committee not in path
Approve an educator-member application (if that tier is adopted) Committee approves under delegated authority
Approve a third-party CE course for credit Committee approves under delegated authority
Adopt a curriculum framework change Recommend; board approves
Change exam policy or scoring Recommend; board approves
Investigate suspected exam misconduct Committee runs SOP; serious cases to Membership & Ethics
Add a new credential or specialization Recommend; board approves

Reporting

  • Written report at every regular board meeting
  • Quarterly metrics: enrollment, exam passes/fails, CE compliance, educator-pipeline health
  • Annual report covering: framework changes, CE statistics, exam integrity findings, educator vetting outcomes, curriculum roadmap

Deliverables in the first 12 months

  1. Published CG standard documents (eligibility, exam, recertification); stewardship of GPS designation documented
  2. CE category definitions and minimums adopted; tracking integrated into member portal
  3. Educator-vetting SOP drafted; if Educator Member tier is adopted, first cohort onboarded
  4. Exam-integrity SOP adopted; first proctored exam cycle delivered
  5. Curriculum roadmap for Year 2

Cross-references