$40,000? (US I presume).
Well, I've been doing a fair amount of research into the various schools, and here are the costs I've discovered so far.
http://www.dnrc.co.uk/culinary_training.htm
If someone sees any mistakes I'd welcome a correction.
As I'm moving to Nanaimo for other reasons, what I've decided to do with my $40,000 is go to Malaspina (the local college) for $2000, then get some experience in some of the better restaurants on Vancouver Island, *then* decide on the most appropriate career path. It might be to apprentice with someone, or it might be to go to a school, probably both.
PS: (technote): the page above was generated by MS Excel, which produces broken, non-standard code. If you can't see it let me know and I'll try to clean it up manually.