I attended as a day student back in 2004 and I feel the need to express my dislike of that place 6 long years later. It is not worth it. Heres why: There facilities are bad. The outlets didn't always work when we were working. I vividly remember the basement classroom area being flooded by the clogged toilet and the light brown water being everywhere. That class day was wasted....money was wasted. The instructors are unprofessional. And have an attitude as if they're not serious about the money you invested. I remember the instructor constantly talking gossip with other instructors and not fully being there for the students. You could literally half-donkey your way through the program and there would be no one there to push you to do better. It was just a paycheck for them. But my favorite memory(sarcasm), was when my instructor a woman by the name of mariah, had a breakdown, started crying, and threatened to quit after her best friend, another instructor, quit because of differences with the management and the toilet incident previously mentioned. Afterwards the newly former- instructor went around telling students how "crappy" the place was, pun intended, and to leave before its too late. Further, the very admissions rep, who to her credit was a nice girl, told me while I was dropping out, that she had gotten a job with the state and "couldn't wait to leave this place". I wanted to be a barber, period. I had no intentions of doing womens' hair, but I found myself doing perms and whatnot at the beginning of the program. They do this to cover themselves since they give you expensive Oster clippers at the second half of the program, so when you realize that you want out ahead of time, you wont take their clippers with you, which is what happened to me. The funniest part of all this is that everyone, and I mean EVERYONE was already working at a barber shop or beauty salon without a license, and openly talked about it to their instructors. The ONLY thing the license is good for is if you want to open up your own shop. I mean really, how much time do you think the state spends going around checking the licenses of the barbers and hairstylists. Not much. If you want to learn the trade, look for a shop or salon that will take you in as an apprentice or buy a book or some dvds on learning the trade. I paid $10,000 in 2004 and it seems as if the tuition has gone up, and it will keep going up because in terms of schools that offer a barber program, there are this one, and one in springfield if I'm not mistaken, they closed the one in quincy. So they're the only one in town and can charge what ever they want. Take my advice and away from an institution whose ONLY concern is to get you money. YOU DON'T NEED TO SPEND THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS TO LEARN TO CUT HAIR.
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