Does being "in" a band help with learning?

Sometime the best instruction around comes from a "band".  Some bands explicitly require that a student agree to become a "member" of the band to "pay back" the teaching team for all their effort.  Som times, there's an assumption on the part of the student that that's the case.

Quite honestly, being associated with a group of good examples cannot do anything but help the prospective student. As I count myself as a "student", I always try to participate with the best quality players that I can spare the time and energy to be part of. To do anything else is to, at best, be stagnant.

In a good teaching environment, the student will be taught from a well structured plan or syllabus and will make good progress.  She/he will have contact with many different people to learn different aspects.  Any good teacher is quite comfortable with having the student learn from other good teachers - and why one approach or environment is better or different from another. )