I’d subscribe to this as well. A great tutor/mentor/trainer can really bring material to life, to give it real-world meaning, to help get across abstract or esoteric points.
It’s also a good way to view the ISTQB material … as exactly that, material. When it’s brought to life, or applied, that’s when it becomes valuable. Unfortunately the approach they’ve taken is book knowledge leading to an exam. They’ve arguably not prepared testers to go out into the world, or at least they could perhaps prepare them differently/better.
That being said, the material may have some inherent value as material, as a tool fot the trainer… I think that’s where I appreciate ISTQB, but their competition definitely has a leg-up when it comes to the practical side. …And which is more useful in the real world? Understandably, ISTQB gets a knocking…