It is not a foolish question. And the short answer is: It is something else, and that does not make it worse. It is a private, for-profit, two-year school that awards certificates rather than bachelor’s degrees. Summit Salon Academy operates in a different lane from the college system you probably knew or imagine for your child, and that lane has its own rules, its own risks, and its own financial logic.
I am not going to tell you whether this school is right for your family. That depends on what your child wants to do with their life, what you can afford, and what this school actually offers when you call and ask. But I can help you read what official federal government data says about it, without embellishment or fear, so that you go into that call with the right questions already prepared.
What Kind of School It Is—and What Kind It Is Not
Let’s start with the most basic question: What is Summit Salon Academy?
It is a private, for-profit, two-year institution located in Tacoma, Washington, in Pierce County, within the Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue metropolitan area. That does not mean the campus is downtown. If your child was planning to live at home and drive there, do not rely on what the map says: Drive the route yourself on a weekday at the time their classes would take place. The actual travel time is almost never what Google Maps promises.
The federal education data system, IPEDS, classifies Summit Salon Academy as a non-degree-granting institution. It offers certificates and other formal credentials, not bachelor’s degrees. And here is something that will be useful throughout the rest of this article: Because it is this type of school, many of the categories we use to compare large colleges—admission rate, enrollment rate, standardized-testing policy—simply do not apply to it. It is not that the school refused to report them. The framework was not designed for it.
There is another piece of context worth having: Summit Salon Academy does not appear in the Carnegie Classification, the system most commonly used to categorize types of colleges in the United States. That does not say whether it is good or bad. It says Carnegie did not assign it a label. Nor does it have any of the federal system’s special designations—it is not a historically Black college or university, a tribal college, or a land-grant institution—something it shares with the vast majority of the 3,012 colleges in this directory: Only 138 have any of those three labels. None of these omissions tells you how your child will feel there. That is something you ask about, visit, and investigate.
Before signing anything, ask in writing for the exact name of the credential your child will receive upon completion and what accreditation the school holds. Also ask whether those credits can later be used at a four-year college, in case that becomes the goal. No official label can spare you from making that call.
A Very Small Community, Almost Entirely Women
This is where the numbers begin to tell you a concrete story about who studies at Summit Salon Academy.
Last fall, the school had 148 students enrolled across the entire institution. All were undergraduates; there was no graduate enrollment. It is a very small school, and compared with the 255 private two-year schools in this same data set that report this figure, it is on the smaller side: Seven out of ten of those schools, or more, have more students.
What does a school this small mean for your child? It does not mean that it is better or worse than a large one. It means there is one specific question you should ask during the visit: Are the courses in your child’s program offered every semester, or only once a year? The answer determines how long it will actually take your child to finish.
Out of every 100 undergraduate students, 94 are women. That is nearly the entire student body. And 37 out of every 100 are between 25 and 64 years old—more than one-third are adults, not teenagers fresh out of high school. This tells you something about the environment: If your child enrolls at age 18, many of their female classmates will be older and will probably already have other lives built around them.
The data on the Hispanic or Latino community is clear: 8 out of every 100 undergraduate students are Hispanic or Latino. It is a small minority, and compared with the 255 private two-year schools in this data set, the school ranks below the group’s midpoint. Having few Latino students does not make the school bad, just as having many would not make it good on its own. It is simply a fact about who is enrolled. If your child will be one of the few, the useful question is direct: What student groups and support services are available, and who in the office speaks Spanish? And speak with a current student before deciding, because your child’s specific program may feel different from the schoolwide figure.
IPEDS does not report where newly enrolled students came from—which state or which country—for this school. That information is simply unavailable.
How Academics Work: No Fixed Semesters, No Bachelor’s Degrees
Summit Salon Academy reported a continuous academic calendar. That means there is no single “August” when everyone starts together. Students enroll when the program opens. This completely changes how you should think about your family’s calendar: There is no fall deadline to memorize; you need to ask directly when your child’s cycle begins.
The school does not award bachelor’s degrees. No bachelor’s degrees appear in the most recent federal report of credentials awarded, something it shares with 254 of the 256 private two-year schools in this same data set—it is normal for this type of institution, not an unusual feature of Summit Salon Academy. If your child’s ultimate goal is a bachelor’s degree, this does not rule it out as an intermediate step, but it does require you to confirm in writing, today, what transfer agreements exist and which credits another school would recognize.
It also did not indicate that it awards credit for life experience or AP exams in its most recent report. That specific question did not measure whether it accepts dual credit from high school; in fact, the school directly responded that it does not enroll high school students in college-credit courses.
For class size, there is one number that helps but should not be stretched too far: 15 students per instructional staff member on a full-time-equivalent basis. Compared with the 255 similar schools in this data set, it falls below the midpoint without reaching the lowest group. It is a middle-of-the-range figure. But be careful: This ratio does not tell you how many students are in your child’s classroom on any given Tuesday. It is an institutional average calculated using a method that IPEDS does not detail. If class size matters to you, ask about it directly.
And about price: Here is a warning worth more than anything else in this section. IPEDS asks schools of this type to report the cost of the entire program, not the cost per academic year. If you compare Summit Salon Academy’s price with that of a traditional college without noticing this distinction, you will be comparing apples to oranges. Ask in writing for the full cost of the entire program and the exact date when your child’s program begins.
The school does report one structured academic pathway: a complete program that can be taken only during evenings or weekends. If your child works, or if you need them to continue contributing at home while studying, that is a concrete question worth asking during the visit.
Open Admission: What It Really Means
Summit Salon Academy reports an open-admission policy for all or most of its first-time undergraduate students. The application fee is $0.
This sounds like a relief, and in part it is: There is no battle over essays and recommendation letters as there is at other colleges. But “open admission” is not the same as “guaranteed entry into any program.” The school describes a general policy; a specific program may have its own eligibility requirements that must be met. Verify those conditions directly with the program your child is interested in.
For the same reason—open admission—several figures that you would normally use to compare colleges simply do not apply here: There is no selectivity rate to calculate because IPEDS does not ask this school for applicant and admitted-student counts. There is no post-admission enrollment rate because that calculation is not required either. There is no reported SAT or ACT policy, for the same reason. None of these gaps reflects a lack of transparency by the school; the selective-admission framework simply does not fit it. If any of these things matters to you—for example, whether an exam is used for placement or a specific scholarship—ask the admissions office directly.
Regarding transfers: In the most recent fall count, the school did not report any students who had transferred in from another institution. The count was zero. That does not mean it does not accept transfer students, nor does it predict what would happen if your child transferred in; it describes only that particular fall. If your child’s plan involves transferring to Summit Salon Academy, or transferring from it elsewhere, ask the admissions office directly about that—and about which credits would be recognized.
Money: The Sticker Price, the Real Price, and the Difference That Matters
At Summit Salon Academy, among 34 first-time, full-time, credential-seeking students who received federal Title IV aid and whose EFC records showed family income below $30,000, the average net price was $24,798. Among 10 students from the same population with EFC family income from $48,001 to $75,000, it was $26,639; among 21 students with EFC family income above $110,000, it was $28,991. For dependent students, the income band combines their parents’ income with their own.
There is a difference of $4,193 between the average for the lowest-income band, which included 34 students, and the average for the highest-income band, which included 21 students. Among first-year students who received any grant or scholarship aid, the average was $24,870.
Even after grants and scholarships were deducted, the average net price for families in the lowest-income band was $24,798 for the largest program, whose reported length was 14 months. If that figure does not fit your budget, it is better to see it today than in August.
An average does not reveal how different the cases within that band were; these data do not support claiming that some families were far below or above the published figure. The income bands in this profile describe first-time, full-time, credential-seeking students who received federal Title IV aid; at public institutions, they use the in-state or in-district rate. The overall average with grant or scholarship aid, when shown, describes first-time, full-time, credential-seeking students who received federal, state, local, or institutional grants or scholarships.
Grants, Pell, and Loans: The Arithmetic of Paying
Among degree- or certificate-seeking students at Summit Salon Academy, 42 out of every 100 received a grant or scholarship that does not have to be repaid. That left 58 out of every 100 without any such aid. Compared with the 256 private two-year schools in this data set, Summit Salon Academy falls in the quartile where grants and scholarships reach fewer students. Among degree- or certificate-seeking students who received this aid, the average was $5,111 per year.
Among degree- or certificate-seeking students, 41 out of every 100 received federal Pell Grants—the aid designed for students with demonstrated financial need.
Put plainly: More than half of the degree- or certificate-seeking students at this school receive no grant or scholarship aid. That does not predict what will happen to your child. But it does tell you something real about the landscape: Aid does not arrive on its own here; you have to pursue it actively.
And now, the number I most want you to take away from this entire article: In the most recently reported academic year, 62 out of every 100 Summit Salon Academy undergraduate students received a federal student loan. That is more than six out of ten. And those who borrowed took out an average of $6,552 that year.
Here, financing with debt is common, not the exception. If your child borrows a similar amount in each year of the program, and the program lasts the full two years, the total could be around $13,104, not including interest. That figure should be considered before the first signature, not when your child is already halfway through the program.
An important clarification: This average is for a single academic year and covers only federal loans in the student’s name. It does not include Parent PLUS loans that parents sometimes sign for, bank debt, or credit-card debt. Nor is it the total debt a student has upon graduation—that would require adding together every year of the program, and that information is not in this report. Do that calculation yourself, with the financial-aid letter in hand, before deciding.
The school does report one specific option for managing payment: an installment tuition plan. It is worth asking about directly because it can change how that large figure fits into the family budget.
Housing, Support, and Campus Life: What Is Available and What Is Not
Summit Salon Academy does not offer its own housing—neither dormitories nor apartments under its control—and it does not report meal plans. This does not remove off-campus housing and food estimates from the official budget; those estimates still exist for financial-aid calculations. But if your child planned to live in a campus dormitory, they will not find one here. Confirm with the school the actual budget it would use to calculate your child’s aid.
It also did not indicate any ROTC opportunities, either in the general category or in any of its three branches—something it shares with the vast majority of two-year institutions: Only 45 of 843 in this guide indicated that they offered one. If your child’s plan includes that scholarship or military career, this school did not report it. Ask directly before removing it from the list; this field says what was reported, not everything that might exist.
The intercollegiate athletics section is marked not applicable—there is nothing to read into it, either positively or negatively.
There is something curious about distance education: Two parts of the same federal report contradict each other. One says the school does not offer distance-education courses; another records 44 undergraduate student taking at least one distance-education course that fall. We cannot resolve that contradiction for you. What we do know with certainty is that zero students took all their courses through distance education—everyone took at least one in-person course. If online delivery matters to your child, request written confirmation of the current offerings for their specific program.
The library component is marked not applicable in the most recent report, so there is no official description of collections or staff. What the school does report is access to digital or electronic resources. If this matters to your child, ask directly where they can study and whether computers are available to borrow.
Finally, the school reports placement services for program completers, participation in the Yellow Ribbon Program, which is related to veterans’ benefits, and a published web address for services for people with disabilities. The fact that these services are reported says nothing about their quality or actual effectiveness; you learn that by speaking with someone who has used them.
Do Students Stay? Do They Graduate?
Of the most recent cohort of first-time, full-time, degree- or certificate-seeking students—19 people in total—16 met the official retention criterion: 84 out of every 100 were still enrolled or had already completed their program one year later.
It is a small cohort, and with numbers this low, two or three different decisions can shift the percentage by dozens of points. That is why we are not going to place it alongside other schools: The comparison would technically exist, but it would not be reliable with so few people. What you can safely conclude is this: More students stayed than were absent from the retention count. The report does not explain what happened to the three people who were excluded—it does not say whether they transferred, left the school, or did something else.
For graduation, there is a more robust figure: Following the cohort that entered in 2020 as first-time, full-time students, 74 out of every 100 completed a program at this institution within 150% of the expected normal time. It is a high figure, and it is worth saying so clearly. But it is equally important to be clear about what it is and what it is not: It is a historical cohort, not a prediction about your child. It includes only students who entered for the first time and attended full time—not students who transferred in or those who began part time. If your child enters as part of another group, this rate does not apply to them; ask for the rate that does apply to their situation.
For longer-term results—the component the government calls Outcome Measures, which normally follows students for eight years—the most recent report marks it as not applicable to this school. That does not mean the institution refused to respond, nor does it allow us to infer how any cohort actually fared. There is simply no entry to read here.
What This Article Cannot Tell You
Everything you have just read comes from reports that Summit Salon Academy and the federal government made public. It is not information about what happens to graduates afterward: how much they earn, whether they find work in their field, or how much debt they carry on the day they finish. That piece of the puzzle exists outside these data, and if it matters to you—and it probably does if your child is considering a trade such as hairstyling—you will have to look for it elsewhere: by speaking with graduates, with the school directly, and with state licensing authorities in the area.
Putting the Pieces Together
You now have an in-depth understanding of one of the three pieces your family needs to make a sound decision: who Summit Salon Academy is, according to its own numbers. It is a school with a high graduation rate among those who start full time and with very few indicators of what happens after a student leaves with a certificate in hand.
You still need to combine this with what your child truly wants to do with their hands and their life, with what they have built so far along their path, and with what your family can and is willing to pay. A real plan comes from those three pieces together—not from any one of them alone.
It is your child’s responsibility to decide whether this is what they want to study and to work hard once they are there. Your responsibility is the money, the paperwork, the dates, and asking the uncomfortable questions before signing. No figure in this article makes the decision for you. It simply gives you, at last, a clear map of where you stand.
Source note: The information in this article comes from public reports from IPEDS (Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System) and the United States Department of Education, primarily covering the 2022–23 and 2023–24 reporting cycles. Best College Aid does not represent Summit Salon Academy or any government agency; this article is not a substitute for direct verification with the institution.