once upon a time, Marvel Beauty Schools stood for something. you could be assured that you were…read morereceiving a quality education from teachers who knew their business.
that is so not true of the London school. students are expected to show up and shovel the parking lot - if you have a slip and fall, oh well, too bad. supposedly there is a cleaning service that comes in nightly, but the bathrooms are never cleaned (blood was left on the toilet paper dispenser for three days and students were told to clean it off themselves) and the students are the ones sweeping, mopping, washing walls and baseboards, and cleaning windows and mirrors.
teachers are blatant about the favoritism. new teachers are quitting within days, the bullying from the other staff - which is done right in front of students - is that bad. the teachers that remain are (with the rare notable exception) elitist and, in general, don't know what they're doing. lessons taught in one class by one teacher turn out to be incorrect in the next class by the next teacher.
there is no emotional support if you're not one of the "golden girls" but if you're a favorite with the principal, Ms Round, or one of the "in" teachers, you can do no wrong. want to pick and choose your customers? no problem. bring your boyfriend to hang around all day? sure! talk and text on your cell phone during class? go for it!
but if you're not one of the favored few, every wrong breath and every independent opinion costs you severely.
if you have learning disorder or medical problems, forget any accommodation because they don't care. unlike other, more modern, and more standards-compliant schools, as far as they're concerned, it's sink or swim and it's solely your problem. accessibility act of ontario? never heard of it.
your marks on assignments, projects, and tests also depend on your standing with the teacher and on the teacher's mood. your marks will be good if she's in a good mood, bad if she's in a bad mood. one student did literally nothing to her mannequin, told the teacher she'd fixed it, and went from a fail to a near-perfect mark.
furthermore, administration can't be bothered to do their job properly - once again, everybody's student loans are going to be late because forms were not signed by the deadline, the principal being either away or "too busy" to get them done. students are now late for rent and bill payments, seeing as that money is their only source of income.
this school is taking in $264,000 per term, yet the equipment - which is insufficient for the number of students - is old, broken down, and filthy unless the students take it apart and clean it themselves (which i'm pretty sure is not allowed). the chemicals are the cheapest of the cheap - when representatives of a top-flight hair product company heard the students use Wella hair colour, they laughed. money is collected weekly for various "fund raising" projects that are pretty much mandatory, yet the students are not told what's done with the money and certainly don't see any benefit.
the basement classroom is ice cold because, as the result of a building inspection, they were told due to the lack of windows, the fresh air return has to be running at all times. not only is there no windows in the basement classroom, but if a fire breaks out on the first floor, the students will be unable to escape as there is no way to directly exit the basement to the outside (as you'd be able to do if there were, for example, windows!).
in the student's salon, where they do cuts for customers, if you're not one of the teacher's favourites, you are required to serve customers that are drunk, stoned, potentially violent, or just plain disgustingly filthy (lice, mold in beards, rank food caught in hair, etc). if the teacher likes you, you can pass on the ticket to someone else. you can sit around all day and do no cuts at all but still get your hours. if you're not a teacher favourite, you MUST accept the ticket or you will be signed out for the day and lose your hours.
in short, the London Marvel school is casting a huge blight on a once-honoured institution.