My experience of obtaining a BA in Fine art painting was so disappointing that it put me off any further higher education until I completed a PGCE. Only until completing this course did I fully realise what I'd learnt. I haven’t been able to afford to pursue an MA, and I really want to now. I want to find a course that doesn’t depend on drinking with the tutors in the pub or simply aping trendy contemporary artwork.

I think that as long as students are aware of how influenced by current trends in the media spotlight rather than contemporary thinking a course can be, then it is a worthwhile thing to do. By placing yourself in a position to do a course, you react to that and make artwork in an accelerated fashion, and that pushes you to make artwork in a more concentrated way than simply setting up a studio and getting on with it.

But if you really want to make artwork then there is no need to be educated, but there is a saying - don’t go reinventing the wheel. This is where art history comes in, and discussion with your peers as well as established artists who visit and are lecturers; ideally you'll get this in art education?

Finally, I do believe that potential MA students must have had experience of the outside world before embarking on a course. There is a particular peculiarity of BA students graduating then immediately starting an MA that I think is mistaken? Perhaps it is a financial thing?

I think it must be helpful in developing your practice, I haven't a formal art education and often feel that I'm challenged when it comes to developing my concepts. I imagine that an art education gives a certain confidence to work and broadens the mind in a 'short cut' fashion as opposed to slowly and gradually finding out information that can be quite obvious but you can miss without a formal education. I also think the support structure and discussion and deadline must be extremely beneficial.