Accredited Barista Master Class: Two Days, Course Details and Unit Outcomes

Our accredited Barista Master Class runs over two days, totalling 14 hours, at Level 3, 28 Elizabeth Street, Melbourne. On successful completion we issue Statements of Attainment for SITHFAB025 Prepare and Serve Espresso Coffee and SITXFSA005 Use Hygienic Practices for Food Safety. The course includes both units; you do not need to arrive already holding SITXFSA005. You must still demonstrate competence in the prerequisite unit.

View our official course details and booking information. Course details checked 2 October 2026.

Course background and related accredited requirements

"Master class" describes a delivery format, not a credential. There is no unit of competency called a master class, and no national register entry for one.

The accredited unit underneath barista training is SITHFAB025 Prepare and serve espresso coffee. What a master class format usually adds is more machine time — which is genuinely valuable, because the unit's requirements are volume-based and the skill is built by repetition.

There is also a real accredited unit above SITHFAB025, and it is not a master class either. It is SITHFAB038 Plan and monitor espresso coffee service, covered further down, and it is the honest answer for anyone who has outgrown the operator unit.

The accredited anchor

What the unit requires

A candidate must prepare and present each of the following on three different occasions, within commercial timeframes:

• Caffe latte
• Cappuccino
• Espresso (short black)
• Flat white
• Long black
• Piccolo latte
• Mocha
• Ristretto
• Short macchiato
• Long macchiato

Ten beverages, three occasions each — thirty preparations at minimum, each within the time a paying customer would accept.

The candidate must also monitor quality indicators for extraction during preparation and make adjustments to restore extraction to the required standard. This is the part that separates the unit from a demonstration: it is not enough to produce a good coffee, you have to notice when extraction has drifted and correct it.

The unit names the five variables you adjust to do that: dose, grind, tamping technique, water flow and water pressure. It also names the factors relevant to quality — ambient humidity, crema, espresso flow, steam pressure and taste — which is a more complete list than most course outlines, and includes the one nobody expects. Ambient humidity is in the unit because it genuinely changes how a grind behaves across a day.

The knowledge evidence covers the characteristics of each beverage, different types of milk and their uses, bean, blend and roast characteristics, and mise en place.

Count the milk: seven of the ten

This is the detail that should decide how a master class format spends its machine time. Both macchiatos take milk, so only three of the ten are milk-free: espresso (short black), long black and ristretto. The other seven require textured milk, each on three occasions.

That means 21 of the 30 minimum preparations involve texturing milk. Milk carries roughly twice the assessment weight of extraction on its own, and a candidate who pours inconsistently fails seven beverages rather than one. If a master class is selling extra repetitions, the repetitions that matter most are jug repetitions. See milk texturing 101.

The "within commercial timeframes" clause is the hard part

Worth drawing out, because it is what most non-accredited coffee courses cannot replicate. Producing a technically correct flat white with unlimited time is a different skill from producing one while three more orders queue. The unit requires the latter, which is why the assessment environment matters as much as the syllabus.

It is also why the extraction-diagnosis requirement is paired with it: under time pressure the grind drifts, the dose varies, the milk gets rushed, and the assessable skill is noticing and correcting mid-service rather than after.

What the unit does not impose is a service-period count. SITHFAB024 requires three service periods including one peak, SITHFAB027 five, SITHFAB030 three and SITHFAB034 twelve. SITHFAB025 requires none. Its whole volume is ten beverages on three occasions each within commercial timeframes. Providers sometimes advertise a peak-service requirement for the espresso unit; that is a delivery choice, not a training package requirement, and it should not be presented as one.

The skill set that solves the prerequisite problem

SITHFAB025 cannot be awarded without SITXFSA005 Use hygienic practices for food safety first — which catches people out when booking a standalone short course.

There is a neater route. SITSS00080 Espresso Machine Operation is a nationally recognised skill set on our scope, and it packages the espresso unit together with its prerequisite and two service units:

That is a realistic description of a barista's actual job: make the coffee, handle food hygienically, serve the customer, take the money. Its stated target group is espresso machine operators in cafes, restaurants, bars, clubs, and function and event venues, and achievement provides credit towards SIT Training Package qualifications. Completing the skill set produces a Statement of Attainment recorded against your USI, and its units can support credit transfer towards a qualification where its packaging rules allow them under Standard 1.7. We first verify the evidence and equivalence, check that the units fit your training product, and check for licensing or regulatory restrictions before granting credit. See ASQA’s credit-transfer guidance.

One fact about it settles a question people ask constantly: no occupational licensing, certification or legislative requirement applies to the SITSS00080 skill set. There is no licence to make coffee in Australia. The food handler training obligation covered below is real, but it is a food safety duty on the business and the handler, not a barista licence, and nothing stops an untrained person making coffee at home or an unlicensed cafe selling it.

The other coffee-relevant skill set is SITSS00075 Beverage Advice, which targets the advisory half of the job rather than the machine. If what you actually want from a "master class" is to talk about coffee with authority rather than to pour faster, that is the code to ask about.

We hold 81 current skill sets, 22 of them in the SIT hospitality package, and most are not advertised as courses — see all courses. If a skill set fits your situation better than a single unit or a full qualification, name the code when you enquire.

Why format matters for this unit

Thirty preparations is a floor, not a target. Espresso is a motor skill built through repetition with feedback, and the variables — grind, dose, tamp, yield, time, milk texture — interact. Reading about them does very little.

So the practical questions to ask about any barista course are about access to a machine:

• How many students share each machine?
• How much hands-on time do you get, as opposed to demonstration time?
• Is the equipment commercial, of the kind you will use at work?
• Is there feedback on extraction, or only on the finished drink?
• Is there feedback on milk texture specifically, given that seven of the ten beverages depend on it?

A format with fewer students per machine produces more repetitions per hour. That is the substantive difference between barista courses, far more than the syllabus, which is fixed by the unit.

No course duration or class size is published here. Both vary, both age badly on a web page, and both are worth asking about directly — the machine-access question above is the one that actually tells you what you are buying.

The real unit above SITHFAB025

If "master class" is meant to signal a level beyond the operator unit, there is an accredited unit that genuinely occupies that level, and it is on our scope as RTO 3722 at deliver and assess to 30 June 2032.

SITHFAB038 Plan and monitor espresso coffee service assesses running the coffee operation rather than making the coffee. Its four elements are:

Its performance evidence requires the candidate to coordinate the operational aspects of espresso coffee preparation for an outlet across at least six service periods, to maintain commercial grade espresso machines and grinders throughout each of those six, and to monitor the consistency and quality of eight named characteristics throughout service: appearance including opacity or transparency, aroma, colour, flavour, freshness, presentation, taste and volume.

Two things about it are worth knowing before you enquire.

First, SITHFAB038 has no prerequisite units at all — not even SITHFAB025, and not SITXFSA005. The entry-level espresso unit is gated; the senior one is not. That is a quirk of the register rather than a recommendation, but it does mean an experienced head barista or cafe manager can be assessed in it directly.

Second, the service-period contrast is the clearest statement of what separates the two units. SITHFAB025 requires none, because making a beverage is assessed by occasions. SITHFAB038 requires six, because running a service can only be assessed across services. If you are choosing between more machine time and the next unit, that is the question: are you trying to pour better, or to run the bench?

Accredited or not

A master class may be delivered as accredited training against SITHFAB025, or as non-accredited skills training. Both can be worthwhile; they produce different documents.

The check: look for the unit code and the RTO number. If a course description does not name SITHFAB025 and carry an RTO number, it is not producing a Statement of Attainment, however good the coffee.

The brand check, with the actual names

An RTO may trade under several registered business names, so the RTO code identifies the issuer, not the brand. An unfamiliar name on a certificate is not evidence of a problem, and a familiar one is not evidence of legitimacy.

That caution is unusually concrete in coffee training, because the Australian Business Register records seven current registered business names for the legal entity COMPLETE HOSPITALITY TRAINING (VIC.) PTY. LTD., ABN 27 006 947 262 — and three of them are coffee names:

So "The Coffee School", "Coffee School by CHT" and "Melbourne Barista" are names of the same legal entity as Complete Hospitality Training, and a master class delivered under any of them as accredited training is delivered by RTO 3722. Note that "Complete Hospitality Training" is itself a registered business name; the legal entity name carries "(VIC.)" and "PTY. LTD.". The dates above are business-name registration dates from the register and nothing more — they are not statements about when any course began.

Verify the code on training.gov.au, not the name on the brochure.

For an experienced barista who already holds the unit, a non-accredited master class aimed at refining milk texture or dialling in a grinder can be exactly the right choice. For someone entering the industry, the accredited unit is the one that appears on your transcript.

Bar and coffee work usually means handling food

Easy to miss, and it is why SITXFSA005 is the prerequisite rather than an optional extra. If you handle milk, cut fruit, plate a pastry or handle ice, you are handling food, which brings you inside Standard 3.2.2A's food handler training requirement — in force since 8 December 2023.

That requirement is lighter than most people assume: the training must cover safe food handling, food contamination, cleaning and sanitising, and personal hygiene — or you must possess skills and knowledge commensurate with the activity. It does not have to be nationally accredited, mandates no refresher period, and the business is not required to keep records of it.

So the accredited unit is not what makes you lawful; it is what makes you provable and portable — and in this case it is also the gate to the espresso unit. See food handling.

On allergens and milk substitutes this page states no legal duty, because there is none in the material behind it and inventing one would be worse than the gap. Separate jugs and proper cleaning for a dairy allergy is sound practice; for the legal requirement your state or territory food regulator is the authority.

The prerequisite, in detail

SITHFAB025 requires SITXFSA005 to be completed or already held before the espresso unit can be awarded. Three ways to satisfy it:

1. Take the skill set SITSS00080, which includes it — usually the cleanest route
2. Clear it in advance through food handling or virtual food handling
3. Already hold it — SITXFSA005 is core in SIT30722 Certificate III in Hospitality (Restaurant Front of House), and it is one of two options in the compulsory Group A of SIT30622 and SIT40422

If you hold it from any Australian RTO, that is credit transfer under Standard 1.7 — your Statement of Attainment is the evidence and there is no reassessment. Raise it at the pre-training review, required under Standard 2.2 of the Outcome Standards for RTOs. We first verify the evidence and equivalence, check that the units fit your training product, and check for licensing or regulatory restrictions before granting credit.

SITXFSA005 is in fact the gateway unit for nine units in the current food and beverage stream: SITHFAB022 Clean and tidy bar areas, SITHFAB023 Operate a bar, SITHFAB024 Prepare and serve non-alcoholic beverages, SITHFAB025 espresso coffee, SITHFAB026 Provide room service, SITHFAB027 Serve food and beverage, SITHFAB030 Prepare and serve cocktails, SITHFAB034 Provide table service of food and beverage and SITHFAB035 Provide silver service. Clearing it once opens all nine, which is the strongest argument for sequencing it first. SITHFAB038, notably, is not among them. Scope that figure to the food and beverage stream: across the wider SIT package SITXFSA005 also sits in front of cookery, patisserie and kitchen units.

What it is worth for pay, and the one place it is worth nothing

A single unit does not move your award classification. A completed Certificate III, relevant to your work and actually used at work, sets a minimum classification of Level 4 under three of the four awards covering hospitality premises:

For a barista this produces a sharp and genuinely useful distinction. The same person, with the same qualification, on the same machine, has a classification floor in a sit-down cafe and none at a food-court coffee counter — because MA000003 clause 4.2 covers food and beverages sold primarily to be consumed away from the point of sale, and expressly excludes cafes providing primarily a sit-down service. The test is sit-down service, not the menu.

Under MA000119 the Level 4 classification is defined in Schedule A as Food and beverage attendant grade 4 (tradesperson), and the award's own "standard rate" is the Level 4 rate.

Two caveats: the qualification must be relevant to the classification you are employed in and you must make use of the skills, so it is not automatic on completion; and MA000058 lets the Fair Work Commission require the employee to demonstrate they utilise the relevant skills. No pay rates are published here — award rates re-set every 1 July, so use the Fair Work Ombudsman's Pay and Conditions Tool with your award code.

Related pages

Coffee appreciation and the accredited alternative compares SITHFAB025 with SITHFAB024 Prepare and serve non-alcoholic beverages, which covers the wider cafe drinks range including milkshakes, juices, smoothies and teas.

Latte art explains where decorative pouring sits relative to what the unit actually assesses — milk texturing is required, the art itself is not.

Barista coffee course covers the standard format, and milk texturing 101 the seven milk beverages in detail.

Where the unit fits

SITHFAB025 is an elective in SIT30622, SIT30722 and SIT40422 Certificate IV in Hospitality. It is not a core unit of any of our qualifications. Completing it standalone produces a Statement of Attainment that credit-transfers into any of them.

For nationally recognised training, a Unique Student Identifier (USI) is generally required before a qualification or Statement of Attainment can be issued, unless an applicable exemption applies. See the official USI exemption guidance. A USI is free at usi.gov.au. If you already have one, recover it rather than creating another.

About us

We are Complete Hospitality Training, RTO 3722, CRICOS provider code 04242E, Level 3, 28 Elizabeth Street, Melbourne VIC 3000, and 410 Elizabeth Street, Surry Hills NSW 2010. Contact melbourne@cht.edu.au or +61 3 9654 1554. See about us and all courses.

The legal entity is COMPLETE HOSPITALITY TRAINING (VIC.) PTY. LTD., ABN 27 006 947 262, ACN 006 947 262. "Complete Hospitality Training", "THE COFFEE SCHOOL", "Coffee School by CHT" and "Melbourne Barista" are all current registered business names of that entity.

SITHFAB025, SITHFAB038 and the SITSS00080 Espresso Machine Operation and SITSS00075 Beverage Advice skill sets are all on our scope of registration as deliver and assess. Completing any of them produces a nationally recognised Statement of Attainment.

We link to the relevant course and regulatory sources in this guide. Check those sources for current requirements, and confirm course availability, delivery, fees and entry requirements with us before enrolling.