I just answered Emily G thusly:
A very wise old photographer once told me that a client doesn't care if you had to hang upside down from a rope to get a shot, they only want the shot. You don't need to go to school to learn photography, you need to get out there and start making images for publications or customers. You'll learn soon enough if you're making the right moves or not, and you'll get paid for it as well.
Back in the old days of film perhaps there was something to a photography school because darkroom work was like cooking, and a school could cut short the time it took to make a GOOD consomme as opposed to just consomme, but with digital this is no longer the case.
The greatest part of photography is NOT having a "gift." The greatest part of photography is knowing how to make the shot that will please the client. Those stupendous photos you see of the moon rising over a New Mexican town, or of a glaring bulldog of a Prime Minister in wartime are because the photographer was in the right place at the right time for a once-in-a-lifetime shot. Wanna know the three-step formula for making pictures like Ansel Adams? One: live at Yosemite; Two: go to one of the great vistas and wait for the light and weather; Three: shoot the shot.
If you're making pictures your customers like and are willing to pay for then who cares if you went to school?
