The UC Berkeley Center for the Science of Psychedelics (BCSP) is proud to have incubated this outstanding, first-of-its-kind program from 2021-2025, in partnership with the University of California, Berkeley School of Education (BSE). The information on this page preserves the history and offerings of the program and is no longer actively updated, effective July 1, 2025.
Educational Research and Evaluation
A core aspect of the UC Berkeley model was its evaluation, which was used to refine the training model. During the 2025-2026 academic year, the program will pause enrollment to focus on analyzing the data collected during the first three years of program delivery.
The UC Berkeley Psychedelic Facilitation Certificate Program was designed as a laboratory school, where best practices in instruction, curriculum, staffing, and overall program design were systematically studied, and results were fed back into the program in a cycle of continuous improvement. Central features of the program included both research and evaluation. There is a dearth of empirical evidence about what works in psychedelic facilitation, how best to design and implement a facilitation training program to meet particular contextual needs, and how to measure success. Faculty Director Dr. Tina Trujillo conducted an internal evaluation of the program’s design, implementation, and eventual impacts. Core team members used the results from this evaluation for ongoing program development. During the 2025-2026 academic year, this knowledge will be synthesized and disseminated across both practitioner and scholarly communities.
Dr. Trujillo is also conducting a longitudinal ethnographic study of the program to explore the sociocultural, political, and epistemological dynamics that transpire in the formation of a psychedelic facilitation program crafted to bridge scientific, spiritual, and other perspectives for culturally, professionally, and spiritually diverse learners. The mixed-methods study will integrate qualitative and quantitative data to analyze the various cultural phenomena that shape and are shaped by the emerging field of psychedelics education.
Doctoral student researchers, Marlena Robbins and Prince Estanislao, supported data collection and analysis for the research and evaluation.
The first round of scholarship, authored exclusively by the Certificate Program’s Core team members, includes Relationality in Psychedelic Facilitation Training Programs: The UC Berkeley Case. This article by Program Director Moana Meadow is featured in the Psychedelic Intersections 2024 Conference Anthology published by the Center for the Study of World Religions and Harvard Divinity School. A forthcoming special issue of the Berkeley Review of Education (a peer-reviewed, open-access journal) will focus on psychedelics and education and be authored entirely by the Certificate Program’s team members.