I graduated from the Savannah College of art & design (scad.edu) and can only offer this. Keep in mind your ultimate goal. What is it that you want to do? Then apply that question to potential schooling and try to determine if it will help. For example, if you want to be a fine art painter, having a BFA in painting won’t necessarily help you. People will only be interested in what you can do, not what a piece of paper says you can do. On the other hand, the skills gained by attending an art school are invaluable. You will improve as a painter by attending school. More so than just painting a bunch on your own.
However if you want to be a graphic designer/artist, then school is a must. My wife (whom I met at SCAD) will attest to that. Illustrators are somewhere between. A full degree would be helpful. A lot of jobs in illustration are freelance. There are several forums available. There is the AIGA (
www.aiga.com) which is an organization of graphic artists. I suggest you look around at the kind of job you want and see if it exists and then decide how to get there.
The other way is to go to is to go to a school that offers a number of different programs and use that to decide what you want. As for SCAD, the education was fantastic, but they did little to educate me on how to apply my education. That was however 9 years ago, so that may have all changed. I can’t offer much help for a non-art specific college. They may have excellent programs as well, or maybe they suck.
I hope this was remotely helpful. Good luck, and don’t let the man break you.