The University of British Columbia (UBC) announced that it is launching Canada’s first blockchain course for graduate students in January next year.
The blockchain and distributed ledger technology training path for graduate students aims to build capacity for existing master’s and PhD students in this area and help scale Canada’s blockchain industry, UBC said in a statement.
The first in Canada offering multidisciplinary graduate education in blockchain technology, the training path will focus on four primary sectors: health and wellness, clean energy, regulatory technology and Indigenous issues.
The first batch consisting of 139 students will be trained over six years.
The initiative is supported by 15 industry partners who will be offering students internships in their institutions.
Mitacs will reserve a potential contribution of $1.324M over six years to match industry funding on an annual basis for up to 18 master’s and eight PhD internships, including skills training and capacity for international experience. This represents a combined potential value of over $2.44M for 156 internships and post-doctoral training projects.
Boehringer Ingelheim (Canada) Ltd. will be a flagship partner, providing funding to support research to apply blockchain technology in health care.
Although blockchain has emerged as a powerful method of providing security and trust in handling data, with a number of technical, economic, social and political applications, there is still shortage of qualified professionals in the industry.
