To offer another point of contrast - while it's true that you often need to spend a year taking courses, in most graduate programs they're very very flexible on

To offer another point of contrast - while it's true that you often need to spend a year taking courses, in most graduate programs they're very very flexible on what courses to take. And those courses themselves are very flexible on how much work you want to do. I don't find this too troubling - it's important to have a shared fundamental knowledge so you can communicate effectively and not reinvent the wheel, and I don't think most programs are giving you busy work (that's really against the whole ethos).