I don't claim the necessity of high paid professors, auditoriums, or football stadiums, but I'm dubious that autodidacticism is a broadly applicable strategy in

I don't claim the necessity of high paid professors, auditoriums, or football stadiums, but I'm dubious that autodidacticism is a broadly applicable strategy in isolation. The best teachers in my life have been public high school teachers, parents, six year olds, tenured professors, and other students. I've taught myself, learned by building, learned from working alongside peers, and learned from formal schooling. None is complete in itself--every time I think I'm proficient in a field because of my self-taught experience, a good teacher comes along and shows me how much I don't know; and vice versa, you never truly understand a skill learned from someone else until you've built something with it, on your own. Guided learning doesn't have to happen in a classroom, but I do believe feedback is essential.