Opinions vary, sometimes wildly.
I've taught college courses for eleven years, and I've seen instructors take creative writing classes only because they thought they would be a fun outlet for their own creativity, an outlet sorely needed after teaching endless sections of basic composition. Since verse is so poorly compensated in our country, poets are forced to find other avenues of making a living. And those avenues tend to be found in higher education. If you're an aspiring poet, this works in your favor. If, however, you desire to write fiction or creative nonfiction, this can be a problem.