STEP 1 - Web Sites

The first step of enrolling at the MetrOasis Advanced Training Center is reading this web page. It is helpful to browse some other MetrOasis web pages if you already know which program you're interrested in. We get emails from people several times each week asking us to tell them about the program that is spelled out on the very page they just sent the email from. Most of the time we simply ignore these emails. You should also check out the other school's web sites. When you do this, do two things. Look at what they say and then look at what's missing. MetrOasis tells you that we're the best beauty school in Alaska. Then we show you the links that prove this. The other schools will also tell you that they're the best, but when you ask them why, the hum & haw and make up stuff, but they won't offer you much of anything in the form of proof.

 

STEP 2 - Entrance Exam

When you decide that the MetrOasis ATC beauty & esthetics school is the school for you, take our entrance exam. The pages leading up to the entrance exam have several qualifying questions. These are the most common questions we are asked. The entrance exam is a general knowledge test to make sure that you can speak English, that you can think and that you can follow directions. We've had numerous people who don't pass this exam contact us and ask if we'll make an exception for them. This entrance exam is in place for several reasons. The first is so that YOU don't waste your money and YOUR time on something that you will not be successful in. Secondly, this is to save US time and money also. Thirdly, this is to prevent you from defaulting on your student loans if you aren't successful in this industry. So, the entrance exam is a really good thing that protects you, protects us, and saves everyone a lot of frustration. Please don't ask us to short-circuit our system. If you can't pass our entrance exam, you CERTAINLY won't pass the chemistry, anatomy & physiology and business sections of our program. Some people ask us to make an exception to our minimum age of 18 years of age. Our goal isn't just to train everybody in town, but to specifically train future salon/spa owners and those specific individuals who have the potential to be the very top hairdressers and estheticians in Alaska. We are also frequently asked if we teach in any other languages. We only teach in English.

 

STEP 3 - Interview

We interview each person we accept as a student. Just as not everyone should be a doctor or a dentist or a pilot or a server, not everyone should be either a hairdresser or an esthetician. We interview people as a further precaution in determining whether you are a good candidate for our school. Because we only accept ONE hairdressing student each month and TWO or THREE esthetician students each month, there are very few openings so we try to carefully screen our students so that a position isn't arbitrarily given to a student who won't appreciate our high level of training. This means that we are frequently booked up for several months a head of time and occasionally up to a year a head of time.  Some people feel the need to start immediately instead of waiting, so they attend a different school. This is totally up to you. Most people feel that a better education is worth waiting for. Some people believe that it doesn't matter which school you attend that you'll learn what you need to know by experimenting on clients in a salon or that the salon will train you. Don't believe it for a second. IF you find a salon that is willing to retrain you, you will have to unlearn the bad habits you learned in beauty school and then relearn the proper techniques. If you think that this is the fast-track to success, consider the amount of time it takes to attend beauty school, the time it takes to discover that you don't actually know anything, the times it takes to find someone willing to retrain you and the time it takes for you to unlearn the bad habits and techniques you learned during your fast-track plan and the time it takes to learn the proper techniques. This fast track actually takes between 3 and 5 times longer than simply learning the right way the first time around. Because of this, we interview.

 

EQUIPMENT & CURRICULUM

If you pass our entrance exam and interview and are accepted into our school, you will begin your training. We do things differently at the MetrOasis ATC beauty & esthetics school for very specific reasons. People are much more mobile than they used to be which means that your training MUST be top class if you hope to compete in several different locations. We travel each year in search of the best training the world has to offer. Not the city of Anchorage and not Alaska. Not even just the United States, but the entire world. Why do we do this? Partially because we take pride in what we do but also because we take pride on our graduates. We are exceptionally proud of our graduates, some of which have gone on to open their own salons & spas, become educators, one even won the national Redken make-over contest. We have graduates working in numerous locations in the United States and also in Europe and Asia. The equipment we include in our hairdressing and esthetician student kits are the same equipment we use ourselves. In fact, our hairdressing kit is the best student kit in Alaska and our esthetician student kit is the best student kit in the United States. It is probably the best student kit in the world, but we really don't have time to research this detail beyond the US. We have also taken numerous students to various places for international training such as Paris, Barcelona, London, Long Beach, etc.

 

SCHEDULE

The regular schedule for the MetrOasis Advanced Training Center is -

 

Wednesday 9:00 am - 7:00 pm

Thursday 9:00 am - 7:00 pm

Friday 9:00 am - 7:00 pm

Saturday 9:00 am - 5:00 pm

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*We do have some students who leave at either 4:00 PM or 4:30 PM for their work schedule. 

 

Theory Class

We teach hairdresser theory at 9:00 AM Tuesdays through Fridays for about an hour and esthetician theory at 1;30 PM Wednesdays through Fridays for about two & a half hours. During this time we work out of the text books that we provide in your educational materials. We do this to help you pass the state board exam. This information is typically older information and frankly, not nearly as good as some of our other materials, but you can't pass your state board exam without this information and this is one of your goals in attending beauty school. We also use other materials that we have gathered from over three decades of training and education. This is the actual practical information and techniques that you will use every day while working in a salon or spa. This information comes from many different sources and many different locations. We may have a special guest speaker, Sue may teach theory or Sigel may teach theory.

 

CLINIC FLOOR & FACIAL ROOMS

While I'm not crazy about this term "clinic floor", it is commonly used in beauty schools so we use this term to save time explaining things to people who don't understand how truly different we are than other beauty schools. Basically, the clinic floor consists of two main parts and some supporting parts. The first part is the salon floor. This is where hairdressing students perform beauty treatments on our clients. This consists of 12 hairdressing stations which include a mirror and power outlets. Each hairdressing student receives as part of their student kit a rolling cart that locks and this is where their supplies are kept. The dispensary is an area next to the shampoo area where chemicals, hair color products, and other supplies are stored and mixed. We don't use a "hot chair" system as some other schools to where the students share chairs so that students must move their stuff numerous times each day. In our school, each student has their own station.  Each of our esthetics students is in their own room which is either a single or a double room. Each room is decorated differently and typically our students are in more than one room during their training.

 

Starting at the back moving forward, Baden Baden (double), Venezia (single), Maui (double), New Orleans (single), Barcelona (single), Edelweiss (double), Paris (double), London (single). 

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Esthetician students store their supplies and materials in their room and they also perform beauty treatments, waxing and facials in these rooms.

 

PRACTICALS & REQUIREMENTS

Hairdressing and esthetics students have different requirements. Practicals are individual beauty services that must be completed to comply with state board while requirements can be certain classes or hours, etc. Hairdressers must complete a minimum of 1,650 hours while estheticians must complete a minimum of 350 hours. These are the rest of the state required qualifications.