An honest assessment. And as usual, the thing itself isn't necessarily good or bad, but how you react is what makes the difference. It sounds like these art courses helped you hash out your own views about art, even if they were very different from those held by the people teaching the course, whereas some students may have just done as they were told and got no farther, either in art or in wisdom.
I don't think school/university and art go together very well, because the grades that you're supposed to be working towards don't reflect either your own satisfaction with your art or the public's reaction to your art, and arguably those are the only two things that matter. Your teachers, by virtue of being immersed in the art world themselves, may be the least qualified people around to tell you how your art will be perceived in the real world.
Art is a great thing to learn about, both the theory and technique, but it's too subjective to be subjected to a standard rating metric, especially at the early stages, when kids are just trying to figure out what they like.
Thank you for your comment. Your right they did help, in their own way! And whether they meant to or not that's why I don't regret going to them! I agree I don't think the two go together that well either, I'm sure an art history course would be fine but that's completely different. And as far as the tutours go I would have loved them to be artists themselves making it in the world, however they weren't, they didn't even do an art form themselves so I didn't quite understand how they could judge us on ours.
I agree, it is a hard thing to teach and shouldn't be based on a metric rating system where you get good or bad grades, I would love to see that change!
Just to digress a little, I feel like it's the same for photo critiques: it doesn't particularly matter whether the critic is right or wrong when they analyze an image - what's important is listening to the critique and deciding for yourself whether it's right or wrong, and why.
I definitely agree with you, I think you do have to take what you can from it all, and if you don't agree with them that's fine too, but criticism is good when it's required!