Red Seal of approval for OCI
Kirk Penton - Jul 30, 2018 - Biz Releases

Photo: Contributed

Score one for the little guy.

That’s how Penticton’s Carolyn Roy is feeling these days after her business scored a significant event recently.

Roy owns Okanagan Cosmetology Institute, and on July 22 it hosted a Red Seal practical exam for the hairstylist trade. She says it was the first time such an exam was hosted in a B.C. location other than Victoria or Vancouver.

The Red Seal Program, formally known as the Interprovincial Standards Red Seal Program, is a program that sets common standards to assess the skills of tradespeople across Canada.

“What kudos for the school. What a benefit to have in the Okanagan,” Roy says. “I have to blow my own horn while I can because as soon as this catches on the larger schools are going to take it, like MC College or Interior Academy out of Kamloops, but I don’t want to be forgotten for the work that we’ve done here in little old Penticton.

“… They had been having this exam at either UVic or through (Vancouver Community College), but never at a private school. So I started to be the squeaky wheel, saying we’re never going to get people from the interior of B.C. when we always have to be going to the Island or Vancouver for these events. If we want to be recognized we need to hold the exam here.”

Hairstylist was finally recognized as a Red Seal trade in B.C. in 2016, so Roy immediately got to work in an attempt to bring the best of the best to OCI. She brought in not only two top hairstylist instructors, but one of them is a Red Seal invigilator—the one who oversees the exam—in Courtney’s Stacey Rexin.

“So anybody that comes to Okanagan Cosmetology Institute gets a premier education from not only an actual Red Seal stylist, but one of the invigilators,” Roy said. “She takes her trade very, very seriously.”

Roy’s daughter Nathania was also a driving force behind OCI’s getting a Red Seal exam. She became a teacher and went on to earn the designation herself, at age 22 becoming one of the youngest to do so.

Carolyn Roy hired Laura Makeiff, who is also from Courtenay, to be a level one instructor at OCI, while Rexin is the head mentor and a level two teacher. It’s a three-year process to earn your Red Seal designation, and Roy hopes to have many more exams at OCI.

“They’re gonna rock,” Roy says of her instructors. “They’re really gonna make this a boutique destination school.”


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