have just within last 2 months come out of ground school brush up with them and have to disagree with some points above.
have found them to be a little disorgainsed but the notes are good, and at groundschool i personally thought HOF is one of those people born to teach, can be a little wacky but an awesome teacher, most of us on the course thought so.
get another set of second hand notes off ebay, its never a bad thing to have 2 sources of info.
I think what people need to bear in mind is what excatly do they expect in the brush up weeks, go in and be taught the entire course (some on my brush up did!) you are there for a week only and supposed to cover up to 6 subjects, impossible for them to teach all that!
As a distance learner you need to put the work in BEFORE you go, and then the brush up will raise your game 10-15%. I think the exam based learning makes sense, if in the class everyone doesnt have any problems with a particular question could be safe to assume you dont need to teach that subject!!