How to Prepare for Level 1 of the Cicerone Certification Program
Much like everyone else, quarantine has given us plenty of time to start and finish the things that we’ve been putting off for the longest. Working in the beer industry it is important for us to have the credentials to back up our efforts, so this month our founders decided to tackle Level 1 of the Cicerone Certification Program. The Cicerone Certification Program focuses on educating and certifying beer professionals in order to elevate the beer experience for consumers. Level 1 - Certified Beer Server focuses on the fundamentals of beer service, styles, and flavor. Here are a few tips that helped us prepare for and pass the exam!
DRINK BEER
While this level doesn’t have a huge emphasis on flavor characteristics it is important to have a frame of reference on what certain beer styles taste like in terms of notes and flavors. Familiarizing yourself with the complex elements of every beer style will help you with word associations while you study. Being able to refer to the breadiness versus floral in a beer will help you associate the beer styles with their respective notes when you’re studying.
In addition to drinking beer, take time to visit breweries. Talking to bartenders and barbacks about flavor profiles, watching proper pouring techniques, and really immersing ourselves in the culture helped us to make sense of the information we read.
REVIEW FREE STUDY TOOLS
Quizlet and YouTube are two great resources to use when studying for the test. Quizlet has a series of flashcard decks that give you a feel of what to expect on the exam. These decks can help you set your expectations because most of them are exact questions from the exam. Below are a few of our favorite Quizlet study decks:
Missed Questions Cicerone Beer Server
TALK TO CICERONES
If you do not have access to Cicerones or others studying to become certified through your personal network, Facebook groups, Instagram and blogs are great ways to get in contact with Cicerones to learn more about their experience. Here is a Facebook group I recently joined that may be helpful!
In addition to these main tips, take advantage of the countless study guides and outlines that are available online.
We’d love to see more people like us legitimizing their beer knowledge and taking it to new heights! Have you taken the Cicerone exam yet? If so, how was your experience? What study hacks do you have? Feel free to share in the comments below!
Cheers,
Courtney
Co-Founder of Black Brew Movement