Alchemy Academy is a leading provider of online courses for food safety professionals. It offers industry training, continuing education, career development, and certification in subjects such a HACCP. Its curriculum is developed in close partnership with industry leaders such as Safe Quality Food Institute, the Produce Marketing Association, and the Food Protection and Defense Institute at the University of Minnesota.
- Furthering a career in food manufacturing
- Getting food safety certification
- Meeting USDA and FDA food safety requirements
- Pros
- Best online platform for HACCP training
- Completely online platform
- All courses run by industry experts
- Cons
- Limited number of courses
- Prior knowledge a prerequisite
The Alchemy Academy catalog has around 30 courses (most in English with a handful in Spanish). Additionally, it offers certification exams for the Safe Quality Food (SQF) program. As well as special ‘Academy Live’ lectures on SQF and other topics.
Courses are aimed at:
- Food safety managers and team leaders
- Plant managers
- Quality control managers
- Line supervisors
- Quality assurance managers
- Food safety consultants
- Production managers
- Maintenance managers
Categories include:
- HACCP (Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point)
- OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration)
- Environmental monitoring
- Produce Safety
- Food defense
- Internal auditing
- Corrective and preventive action
- PCQI (Preventive Controls for Human Food)
- Managing kosher food production
- Protek (people assurance)
- Supervising people
- Statistical process control
All Alchemy Academy’s courses are self-paced but designed to be completed in a day or less. Course lengths typically range from two hours to eight hours. There are also a handful of 15-minute courses, such as the ‘Food Defense in 15 Minutes’, which quickly outlines what employees and supervisors need to know about detecting, reporting, and recording intentional adulteration incidents.
The longer courses are broken down into modules. For example, the 8-hour Basic HACCP Certification comprises 11 modules:
- HACCP overview
- Regulatory updates
- Applying HACCP principles
- Prerequisite programs
- Hazards overview
- Preliminary steps to HACCP
- HACCP principles 1 & 2
- HACCP principles 3, 4 & 5
- HACCP principles 6 & 7
- Validation & reassessments
- Measuring effectiveness
Each course is delivered by one of Alchemy Academy’s food manufacturing and production experts. The team includes:
- Jeff Chilton, a Certified Lead Instructor for HACCP workshop who has 15 years of experience as plant manager of two large food processing companies.
- Jorge Acosta, a certified auditor and trainer in BRC, SQF, and FSSC standards with more than 20+ years of food industry experience.
- Tim Newbold, a certified auditor and trainer in BRC, SQF, and FSSC standards with more than 25 years of food industry expertise, including 15 years in the baking industry.
- Rick Gehrke, an auditor and environmental health and safety consultant with more than 25 years of experience in various industries–from food production to automotive and aerospace manufacturing.
The Alchemy Academy Website is fairly straightforward to navigate. Each course has its own page where you can take a good look at the agenda and learn the benefits of that particular course. Most of the courses include some form of certification upon completion. For example, students who complete HACCP courses receive an official international HACCP Alliance certificate of completion. The courses are 100% online, with no need to travel away from home or the office to take the course or receive certification.
Each course is sold individually, with prices ranging from $25 for 15-minute courses to $499 for full-day advanced certification courses. Some courses can also be purchased in bundles ranging from $399 to $999. SQF courses and exams range from $50 to $700.
Here are some sample prices:
- Advanced HACCP Certification - $499
- Corrective and Preventive Action Fundamentals - $399
- Hospitality Management Principles for Preventing the Spread of Infection
- Food Defense in 15 - $25
- Course Bundle: Basic HACCP / Implementing SQF Systems - $999
- Course Bundle: Internal Auditing Basics and Advanced - $599
- Course Bundle: Alchemy of Leadership - $399
The Alchemy Academy website is operated by Alchemy Systems, a subsidiary of Intertek Alchemy. In Austin, Texas. Intertek Alchemy provides training to companies in the areas of food safety, workplace safety, compliance training, and occupational health and safety. Alchemy Academy is focused on providing online food safety training to individuals and companies.
Food safety training is the type of thing that you traditionally had to learn in person. Thanks to Alchemy Academy, this is no longer the case. Now you can take courses and exams from home at your own pace–all with insights from leading industry professionals. The great thing about Alchemy Academy is that it works with all the top industry bodies, so completing a course actually gets you the certification you need.