MetrOasis® Advanced Training Center & Beauty School is the premier boutique beauty school of Alaska, located in mid-town Anchorage. 907.276.4110
European Techniques | American Precision | Alaskan Integrity
Established in 1995 and we improve every single year!
MetrOasis Student Catalog
2025-2026
Revised May 8, 2025
Be Careful!
Since you just went through our entire student catalog, you are most likely looking for a school to train you to be either a manicurist, a hairdresser, or an esthetician. Our advice to you is to be very careful. What does that mean? So if you make a bad choice you're not gonna die or something, but you will end up with bad training, and be out a lot of effort, a lot of time, and a lot of money which can be extremely frustrating. Even worse than this is you may end up with a bad taste in your mouth regarding training in the beauty industry or even the entire beauty industry as a whole.
What to look out for.
Experience and length of time in the industry.
A couple of real basic things to look out for while you search for a school. I would watch out for schools that just opened their school a couple of hours ago but claim to have the best training available. I would also watch out for someone who is a late teen or an early twenty-something with the same claims. Don't be shy, ask the instructors that will be teaching you where they're trained, how long they've trained, how they like the industry, etc.
Type of Financing
Does the majority of the funding for the school you're looking at come from government agencies? This means that their students either couldn't qualify for a student loan because of their credit, they couldn't arrange their finances to pay for their training, of they're special in some way, (rehabilitation, learning disabilities, behavioral problems), etc. When you find your school, you will learn from your text books, videos, other curriculum, you will learn from your instructors, but you will also tacitly learn from your schoolmates and the quality of those school mates will determine how much you learn through osmosis, and the speed of your training will be influenced by your classmates.
Class Size
This can be a really important factor when it comes to the quality of your training. Are you going to be one of three or four, will you be one of eight students? Many schools start four students at a time, but they only have communal bed and one communal machine. Yes, I'm serious. You'd be surprised at the quantity as well as the quality of equipment at various beauty schools.
Will you complete your program but not be able to cut a straight haircut?
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Or start your career but still not know which finger to put your scissors on?
>. >. >. >. >.
Will you start your new career doing
haircuts that look like your 4-year old
sister did them?
Will you be learning facials and beauty
treatments in a shampoo bowl?
Will you be learning facials and beauty treatments in a giant room with all the students and all the clients together laying on fold-up Costco office tables?
With NO equipment at all?
Will it be even worse and you'll be learning facials and beauty treatments in a giant room with all the students and all the clients together ON FOLDING CHAIRS and still with no equipment?
So these photos are terrible right? That's not really the only problem though. All of these photos are in the public domain because they were published on social media. This means that these schools aren't just clueless about proper techniques, salon/spa etiquette, business or even a slight understanding of the beauty industry as a whole...
The really bad thing is that these photos were published with both pride and cluelessness. These schools were so impressed with this level of competence that they wanted to publish these photos for the world to see.
DO see them, study them, and note the things that these schools think that this level of professionism is not just ok, but this is such a high level of professionalism that they presented this to the world as their version of being at the top of their game!
OUR game is much different than this!
Will you actually perform quality work and hold yourself to high level of performance when your instructors don't?
Will you be performing illegal and dangerous work like using aniline derivative dyes on eyebrows which was intended ONLY for hair like this photo?
What is the quality of the work you will be doing, which is directly related to the quality of the education and training that your instructors have. Both of these photos were published by local beauty schools who were so proud of their work, they wanted to show these to the public.
Will you attend a school who advertised that they had the best "teacher/student ratio in Alaska" despite our complaints to the State of Alaska, who, in fact were forced to turn in their professional license for not having any licensed instructors on site for years?
Will you be learning from instructors who have lengthy criminal records? In many states you can not hold a professional license with a criminal record. Not in Alaska.
Are you going to be using products that are illegal for students to use in Alaska like "medical grade peels"?
These details are just the tip of the iceberg of the various questionable practices that occur on a daily basis in Alaska. So, don't be shy, bring a notepad and a pen with you and don't be afraid to ask the hard questions. Those who do not do these things do not do them by choice which means they have thought these issues through and they will usually not have any problems discussing them with you. On the other hand, those that do these things as a usual way of doing business will either be surprised by your question because they don't even understand that their normal way of doing business ranges anywhere from bad practices all the way to illegal. And, there are those who will try to avoid answering these questions by feigning anger and outrage hoping that you back down and stop asking them questions.
Or... you could just ask us and we'll explain why we do what we do, how long we've been doing it, and where we learned the techniques that we use. It's up to you.