Sean:

Enjoyed your piece but there are very legitimate Art Institutes (Art Institute of Chicago, Rhode Island College of Design, among others) that are competitive to get into and provide world class experience and real degrees to their talented classes.

My daughter studied at the Art Institute of Chicago and we found the instruction and requirements to be top notch.

I guess the message is, you can't characterize all the schools named "Art Institute" together.

The students would be wise to look at graduation rates and interview alumni to further verify the claims of the institution.

Walter