A Spring Surge for Wine Education

The founder of the Wine School of Philadelphia is reporting a surge of interest for wine education. "Wine tastings are no longer enough for many people" says Keith Wallace, "we are having to triple the number of wine certification programs we are running just to keep up with demand."

People interested in wine semester-long wine education programs at the Wine School of Philadelphia has tripled since 2001, says Mr. Wallace. However, interest has expanded furiously in the past few months. "Over the last five years, we have seen steady increases in interest in both our wine tasting classes and our our semester-long programs. But this year it is ridiculous. Our waiting lists are longer than our class lists."

Mr. Wallace says the popularity may be from the positive press the Wine School has been receiving, but he feels that its mostly a growing field of study. "Many Americans want to become a sommelier or a winemaker. While its true that many of our graduates do become sommeliers and some have gone on to degrees in Oenology, I always stress that we are not in the business of creating sommeliers. That's just not what we want to do. We are in the business of wine knowledge, and nothing else."

To keep up with demand, the Wine School of Philadelphia has added three Wine Foundation certificate programs to the Spring Roster. That includes one week-long Accelerated Foundation program beginning March 13th and two semester-long Foundation programs beginning in early April. The school is also running an Intermediate Wine Certificate program and their Advanced Certificate as well. "This does not include the Foundation Program we run for the University of Pennsylvania," says Mr. Wallace.

The Wine School of Philadelphia's programs are considered to be the most innovative wine education programs available currently. It's graduates are running major wine distribution companies, working as wine buyers for major wine brokerages, developing online social networks for wine lovers, working as brand managers for major wineries, running vino-tourism companies, operating wineries and microbreweries, attending oenology programs at several major universities, managing wine stores, running wine import companies, writing wine reviews for glossy magazines, and —of course— working as sommeliers up and down the East Coast.

People interested in wine education can log onto the Wine School website at www.vinology.com and click on "Certificate Programs" on the left hand menu.

Daily, March 13th-16th The Accelerated Foundation Program (11am-4pm)


Thursdays, April 5th - May 24th The Foundation Program (7:30-10pm)


Tuesdays, April 10th,- May 29th The Foundation Program (7:30-10pm)