Entrance Exam

We require an entrance exam for several reasons. One of which, is to prevent our classes from being bogged down by a student that can't keep up. Another is to prevent a student from investing months of effort and thousands of dollars to prepare for an exam that they will not be able to pass. Another is to prevent that same student from getting into a career in which they can't prosper. Our entrance policies are here to protect us and they're here to protect you.

So, let's do an analogy. Seat belts.

"I don't like wearing seat belts because they're too uncomfortable." So, does the person in the hospital bed seem more or less uncomfortable than wearing a seat belt? You wear a seat belt to prevent the worse discomfort of being stuck in a hospital bed.

YOU - This is how this issue relates to you. Some of the comments/questions we've had recently... It's not fair that I can't enroll in your program just because I couldn't pass a test." Actually, it is not only "fair" it is SUPER-fair because we're trying to prevent you from being frustrated and broke. THAT'S fair isn't it? "I have really bad ADD." Well, you're still going to have "really bad ADD" when you attempt to pass the state board exam which is WAY harder than passing our entrance exam. So, if we accept you even though you failed the entrance exam, or cheated your way in, how are you going to pass THAT exam? Cheat? "But I have really bad test anxiety." Same answer, you're going to have really bad test anxiety when you try to pass the state board exam but you'll be WAY more stressed out than sitting at home on your lap top in your own environment. These are all reasons that have to do with YOU. Please don't attempt to short circuit our system.

OTHERS - Now, for the reasons that relate to others. You will most likely be sitting in a class of 5 to 10 hand picked people learning the beauty business and and we must prepare you for the same state board exam that all the other students in the other states must pass. The hours required in other states might range from 1,200 down to maybe 650 hours. In Alaska, WE only have 350 hours to prepare you for the same exam. So, if the entire class has to stop so that we can explain the same sentence to you 7 or 8 times (happened before), or if we have to stop 4 or 5 times during every single sentence and SPELL all of the 2 or 3 syllable words for you (happened before), you would have not only ripped US off, ripped YOU off, but you would also have ripped all of the other students in your class off because they paid for an entire program but they're going to have to proceed through that program at 10%-15% of the normal speed, which means that you have now stolen THEIR programs from them as well. So, there IS no reason to allow people that can't pass the entrance exam to enroll in one of our programs, or to keep a student enrolled that has cheated their way into one of our programs.

Our entrance exam and our interview is how we screen our students to make sure that they can keep up and that they're not going to interfere with our other students from completing their programs.

Another point to this blog post is that our entrance exam barely qualifies students to enroll in one of our programs as the materials that we cover in the programs are MUCH more difficult to master than our entrance exam. If we allowed you to simply skip the entrance exam, what would you do in school? You would not be able to keep up. We cover chemistry, anatomy & physiology, cosmetic ingredients, communication skills, business, etc. There ARE not short cuts. This requires a lot of effort.

The final point I'd like to make is regarding confidence. When you accomplish something of value, something

that was difficult you feel great, you are beaming with confidence. When you accomplish something mediocre or when you cheat your way through something you gain no confidence whatsoever because you haven't

achieved anything worth mentioning. Our students work really hard to accomplish their goals and it is important that all of our students have intelligent and professional companions with which to interact. This is how we maintain the quality of our school culture. We will not compromise our environment or the level of education that we provide our students. The results that are obtained today are the result of work done previously. Simply retesting and retesting until you receive a passing score creates an artificial appearance

of accomplishment which will quickly come crashing down when you fail to pass the state board exam.

Still want us to enroll you even though you can't pass the entrance exam or the interview?