Another viewpoint ...
Last year I corresponded briefly with D. Jeffery Mims who is building an Atelier in Southern Pines, NC. If I remember correctly, the part-time fee for one Thursday night per week, open studio on Saturdays, and assignments for when you're not there was $250 per month. Considering who's teaching, that's probably the average part-time cost for most Ateliers that have such a program. I can't imagine Frank Covino or Virgil Elliot charging more than that, maybe they do, I dunno.
Concerning cost benefit: I also wrote a guy who spent a few months at Atelier Mims (not sure of the name) very early in the program and he raved about it. They started with basic drawing methods and eventually worked up to sight-sizing and cast drawing and eventually to painting. He had just begun monochromatic studies (black and white only) in gauche which would eventually lead to a single color being added, then another, then so on. He said no one moved on the the next phase without nailing the current one and he was quite confident that anyone finishing up after four or five years (part-time) would leave with at least the technical skills (the craft) to do just about anything in art. Of course, imagination and style is another matter
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I'd love to go to an Atelier part-time but there's not one within driving distance. And since none of the acomplished classical painters in my area will even return an email, it looks like it's books, videos, and web forums for me. We'll see if that's enough.
Minh "Teacherless" Thong