Starbucks Global Academy expands free learning with 60 courses worldwide

Starbucks Global Academy gives partners, customers, community members and learners around the world access to more than 60 curated courses, built with Arizona State University and organized to run far beyond a store training room. Starbucks says the platform is meant to deliver world-class learning content and remove barriers to high-quality education, but for baristas and shift supervisors the harder question is whether that learning changes pay, title or schedule.

The academy is split into four schools, Pursuit of Good, Third Place, Coffee Academy and Opportunity. Within Coffee Academy, Starbucks lays out Level 100, Level 200, Level 300 - Brew and Craft, and Level 300 - Origin and Ethical Sourcing, a ladder that starts with coffee basics and moves into roasting, blending, brewing, craft and sourcing. The main site says learners can “join a global community of learners and explore world-class education through the lens of Starbucks.”

That structure matters on the floor because it gives a barista or shift lead a modular path through coffee knowledge without waiting for a formal classroom seat. Starbucks has also built a 15-course To Be Welcoming curriculum with ASU to address bias through understanding the human experience, and the introduction features documentary filmmaker Stanley Nelson. The company is extending the same learning model across regions, with versions in Asia Pacific, EMEA, Latin America and the Caribbean, and Canada.

Starbucks launched Global Academy across Latin America and the Caribbean on July 5, 2022, underscoring how the program has been localized for different markets and languages. The education push is part of a longer Starbucks-ASU relationship that Training Industry traces back to Howard Schultz and Arizona State University president Michael Crow, and the companies later opened the ASU-Starbucks Center for the Future of People and the Planet on April 15, 2021, to focus on scalable impact.

Taken together, the platform shows Starbucks building a training system that reaches well past the apron. What it still has to prove is whether moving through more than 60 courses, or climbing Coffee Academy’s levels, translates into better hours, a promotion or a route out of the café into another Starbucks role.