It's my honest belief that you can have a standardized system and an open mind at the same time. If the people who put the system together are always looking at new developments and evaluating them to see what they might offer the system, that's open-minded. But the system may be quite prescriptive in the meantime, with slow evolutionary changes.
There is no question that the DIR/UTD type systems are relatively prescriptive and highly standardized, because standardization is seen as a significant value of the system (and I believe it is). But it's kind of ironic that virtually everything I own or do was a matter of personal choice . . . I just chose to adopt what the system uses, because it works for me.
Not everybody wants to dive this way! But the point of the thread, as I have reiterated quite a few times now, was to tell people who are already INTERESTED in the system, that there is an option to do an entry-level class without making a bunch of expensive gear changes. After the class, they can evaluate whether this approach is one they want to take further.