Future barbers cut a career path at Uniondale High School

Taliyah Hobbs prepared to wash and set the hair of her first and only client of the day on a recent morning.

Hobbs rested the girl's neck on the edge of a sink designed for this very purpose and used an attached hose to bathe the customer's hair in soapy water.

Afterward, she straightened and set the hair of her client, who still had enough time to leave the converted art room at Uniondale High School and attend her next class, as did Hobbs.

A 16-year-old junior at Uniondale, Hobbs and 13 of her fellow 11th and 12th graders are part of a new school program through Nassau BOCES designed to teach them how to be barbers and hairdressers while also providing a window into the business side of the haircutting business.

For Hobbs, the program has taught her to cultivate and maintain a list of clients.

“When you build that clientele," she said, "it lets people know that you can do hair.”

The program has 100 students on a waitlist for classes in the fall semester, according to school officials, and it comes as demand for barbers, hairstylists and cosmetologists — spurred by the coronavirus pandemic-caused recession in 2020 — is projected to increase 19% through 2030, according to the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Principal Mark McCaw said students in the Uniondale high program earn class credit, and upon completion of 500 hours of training, are ready for the state exam to obtain a barber license. The morning class is led by a BOCES instructor in partnership with the high school. Students who come in get their hair cut or styled free of charge, McCaw said.

“It’s giving kids options and I’m not saying that we want them to do this instead," McCaw said. “We’re talking about in addition to, if you do get a certification in barbering, you can take that with you to college. My thing is for kids to leave here with a diploma and a pathway … and maybe even a certification if they can.”

McCaw, a graduate of Uniondale High School, said the decision to bring the barber program hinged on its relatively low cost — the district pays an estimated $140,000 annually to Nassau BOCES. In comparison, setting up a culinary class costs an estimated $157,000, according to Nassau BOCES. 

It was also a popular choice among students surveyed on courses they'd like taught,  according to McCaw. And McCaw, who is Black, cited another reason.

When he takes his son for a haircut at one of Uniondale's many barber shops catering to a predominantly Black and Latino clientele, McCaw said he sees customers and barbers who look like him. The program offers participating 11th and 12th graders — a mix of mostly Black and Latino students — an opportunity to get licensed and stay local, working in one of those community barber shops, or branch out and break into the business elsewhere, he said.

Barbershop student Cassel Antoine, 16, gives a shave to Tyreese Goins, 19. Student Olga Ciciliane, 19, gives a facial to Jose White, and Nataly Giron, 18, practices her skills during barbershop class at Uniondale High School.  Credit: Newsday/ Alejandra Villa Loarca

Barbering is one of 16 job-training programs in six Nassau school districts, said Judith Hynes, assistant director of Nassau BOCES.

Hynes said the Uniondale barbering program offers "students an opportunity to gain a skill that they could now use working in someone else’s barbershop or salon gaining experience so that they could open their own.”

Keith Willis, who took ownership of Another Level Barbershop in nearby Baldwin three years ago, gave the student barbers in the program a piece of useful advice that had little to do with the latest hair styles or barbering techniques.

Willis told them the best way to understand what it means to be a professional barber, is to treat the class "like a business."

Jonathan Marshall, a junior, just wanted to cut hair. But finding the time to take class off campus while balancing his school workload was close to impossible, he said. That changed when he enrolled in the Uniondale program.

The experience has reinforced one of the reasons he plans to make a career cutting other people's hair. Whether a customer just wants a trim or goes in for more involved hair styling, it “makes them feel better,” said Marshall, 16.

Other students in the class said they see the both the personal and professional benefits of barbering.

Olga Ciciliane, 19, wanted to be in the program because doing one’s hair is “part of your daily life, daily routine." During a recent class, the senior was giving student customers moisturizing facials.

Cassel Antoine, 16 and a junior, uses Instagram to highlight his haircutting skills

“I wanted to take [barbering] as an advantage and possibly make a career,” Antoine said.