I had a good experience at the Arkansas Writers MFA Workshop at Univ of Central Arkansas, one of many schools that has abandoned the Iowa model of cutthroat critiquing in favor of promoting mutual support among students. That's much easier to do when the classes are small and the ratio of faculty to MFA students is 1:3.

I agree completely about how one learns to write (by writing). Formal programs can be useful--though too many exist only to turn out writing teachers--but the way to hone your craft is primarily by cultivating an attitude of readiness to revise and rewrite as many times as necessary to get it right.

As for critique groups, both in and out of school, I find that I learn more from critiquing others' work than from any feedback I receive. There are exceptions--writers who know how to call may attention to a plot hole, a thinly developed character, a lapse in tension, or in poetry a line I didn't need--but most of what I need from peer readers is a sense of what they understand my words to mean.

MFA program admissions are absurdly competitive, and even the low-res ones can leave you saddled with more debt than you'll ever be able to repay. I'm sorry your experience was less useful than it could have been, but sad to say, I think it's typical of many of the "top" programs.