Fleur Bunting, a Level 2 Hairdressing student talks to us about her journey so far at college and her ambitions to become a trichologist. We were interested to hear where her passion evolved from and what the steps are to becoming a specialist in the field.
Fleur had a negative experience at Sixth Form, so coming to college was a big step for her.
“I didn’t get on very well at Sixth Form, I’ve always been interested in hair but I didn’t want to pursue it because I thought it was more of a hobby. I didn’t want to try it as a career and then end up destroying my hobby. I wanted to leave Sixth Form so I took the risk to study Hairdressing at college. It was an amazing risk.”
Knowing hairdressing is a skilled trade, Fleur wanted to learn everything from scratch.
“I started off at Level 1 because hairdressing is a trade. I didn’t want want to come in at Level 2 thinking I knew everything and then set myself up for failure. I got to learn the basics and see whether I liked college. I was nervous coming to college because I thought it was going to be the same experience as Sixth Form but its completely different.”
Fleur plans to go to university to train to be a Trichologist.
“There’s so many things that have been amazing on the course, I can’t specifically pick one. It’s all been fantastic, from getting to know new people, to learning new skills and going into the industry on placement. I’ve enjoyed everything about it.
The work placement was great because you get to know how a salon works, not just a college salon. We have to had a placement on each level, this year, mines in Derby as its closer to home. It’s nice to experience a busy working salon environment. My end goal is to go into trichology. I don’t want to just stick to hair. Trichology is a specialist scalp doctor, so implanting hair follicles, hair transplants and skin graphs on the scalp. To get into that you need to do hairdressing first before studying it further at university. I want to get salon experience incase I decide later in life that I want to go back to doing that.”
The career day at college helped Fleur pick her path.
“I have one more year on my Level 2 course and then I will be going onto Level 3. After that, Once I have gained all my UCAS points, I will be going to university. I didn’t know trichology existed into we had a careers day in my first year. They got some previous students to come in and talk to us about their routes. Some went on to teaching, doing TV hair and makeup and one was a Trichologist. I thought it sounded interesting and technical. I did some research and decided that it’s what I want to train for.”
“The tutors have been fantastic, Julie, my tutor, is my number one woman. I’d be nowhere without her and Michaela.”