I went to one that was employer paid, it was for VB back in 1998. It was a multi-day class and we were tested at the end. At that time, I had learned about 3 programming languages and been employed for many years as a programmer.
The class had about 12 people in it. Too much time was wasted story telling... classmates talking too much about programs or problems setting things up.
When they group people together like this, there's no way to know what each student needs/wants out of the class and address everyone's needs.
If they want $900~$1,400 ... I'd concider that a good chunk of change.
I'd go to iTuneU and go thru all the Stanford vids and the presentations from Apple. I'd also hit up all the YouTube vids, someone did the entire 'for dummies' book on YouTube.
I'd probably get the dummies book, as they are cheap and explain things well.
What I got from the class could have been done in 1 afternoon 1 on 1 training.
I didn't pay, so it wasn't a bad deal for me. _IF_ I had paid, I would have been pissed. Understand that grinding thru a book is no party! But a book can be had for < $50.
Based on past learning, the real important part comes when you learn more advanced things (IMO), this is where you have to go thru 10 books to find anything new you didn't know already.
If you take a stack of books, most of them are going to repeat the same thing for 1/2 or more of the book. Getting from 'Hello World' to advanced performace tuning can be a bear, that's where I would spend the money/effort!
Just my opinion... I tend to be tight with the $$$
