Richard Lee, owner of Coffeeshop Blue Sky dispensary, places an ad in the East Bay Express offering classes on how to grow cannabis. Calls pour in, and Oaksterdam University is born with Lee’s friend and fellow cannabis activist Jeff Jones opening a Los Angeles campus three months later.

OU goes on the road to Ann Arbor, Mich. and holds the largest class ever of 320 people drawn from all over the Midwest. The seeds planted are thousands strong once a campus opens in Flint for the next few years. While educating 55 students nearly every weekend on Basic and Advanced Business (the “Classic Program”) in both L.A. and Oakland, OU opens another campus Sebastopol in North Bay, Calif.

Richard Lee writes an open-source document to control, tax, and regulate cannabis for adults. Oaksterdam begins to collect signatures on what will become Proposition 19, the first statewide legalization ballot initiative since 1972 and the first to have a chance at ending marijuana prohibition in 73 years. Dale Sky steps out as the spokeswoman (accidentally and against her will).

OU’s Oakland campus expands to meet demand, opening at 1600 Broadway with 30,000-square-feet of classroom and administration space, plus a 10,000-square-foot basement nursery for cannabis. Prop 19 sparks the campaign heard ’round the world, and demands massive criminal justice reforms in California reducing arrests by 87% the very next year for all ages (not just 21 and over). Although it fails by a slim margin, the effort becomes a blueprint for Colorado and Washington, and the coalition for legalization nationwide is solidified. Many nations take notice, and have since surpassed the U.S. in reform.

The IRS, assisted by U.S. Marshals, ATF, and the DEA, raid OU’s school, dispensary, nursery, museum, and Richard Lee’s apartment, forcing Lee to retire under threat of a Continuing Criminal Enterprise charge if he continues with his locally-sanctioned, permitted, tax-paying businesses. The school reopens with Executive Chancellor Dale Sky Jones at the helm as President and CEO. The Freedom Fighter Scholarship Fund is launched to provide scholarships to veterans.

OU begins to hold seminars in Rhode Island; Atlantic City, N.J.; Denver, Colo.; Las Vegas; Palm Beach, Fla.; Louisville, Ky., Washington, D.C., and New York City, bringing cannabis education across the U.S in various seminars for Business, Legal, Horticulture, Science, Extraction, Budtending, and Continuing Medical and Legal Professional Education credits (CME & CLE).

OU creates the Office of Government Relations and Public Affairs and delivers comprehensive training programs for the California Board of Equalization (now the CDTFA); and the Florida Department of Health’s Office of Medical Marijuana Regulation (OMMR) and Department of Agriculture. OU also holds classes for several universities.

OU educates internationally in Jamaica, Uruguay, Mexico, Germany, Israel and throughout the U.S. After years of working to Reform CA, voters passed an imperfect version of the policy. Finally the cannabis market in California, the largest economy in the U.S., is state-sanctioned activity.

OU launches its first full online certification course, Indoor Horticulture, and celebrates its 10-Year Anniversary with a huge bash of 420 people, featuring Pioneer O’Dammy Awards, live music, dinner, dancing, and a hash bar — allegedly. We publish the Oaksterdam Legacy Book to commemorate history.

OU reimagines and rewrites our Business of Cannabis curriculum providing the comprehensive foundation for professionals entering or working with the industry. The Capstone Project is the most intensive semester, perfect for launching business plans.

A fire that ignited in the BART passage next to OU takes over the art installation, then our campus, in a conflagration, forcing the physical building to close the same the week the governor issues COVID-19 shutdown orders in March. Staff quickly regroups and finds a way to move classes completely online, reinventing our business model and how we deliver information. Like a phoenix from the flames, Oaksterdam is reborn and now based in your living room … and chat is finally allowed!

OU rebrands with an entirely new logo replacing the beloved crest with a sturdy shield. New programs like Budtending and Extraction & Manufacturing are offered for workforce development, conveying detailed instruction for important roles. Oh, and the Hort Team spends over a year completely revamping our horticulture program for commercial use.

OU faculty and staff launch twice-weekly chats on Clubhouse, spending more than two hours offering mentorship for equity cannabis business success every Thursday, and Plant Talk every Friday — discussing anything from issues facing the struggling plant in your closet to helping operators of massive grow facilities improve their yields. Open to the public, the networking and troubleshooting alone is worth more than that consultant you don’t really need.

OU earns contracts with the cities of Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Palm Springs to offer technical assistance for business and workforce development — the very policies we fought to include in the California budget and industry. We are proud to work with participants who are qualified, and those who are still trying to establish the policies they must live with. More than a thousand scholarships have been provided over the years to individuals who need financial assistance.

OU adds contracts with the City of Oakland and State of Connecticut to offer technical assistance for business and workforce development. The Oaksterdam Nonprofit for Education, (The ONE) a 501(c)(3) is established for educational scholarships and standards for program and educator certification. OU celebrates 15 years of quality education for the cannabis industry with all of YOU, our amazing Alumni, representing the industry in leadership positions around the world. Thank YOU!