Generalisations based on other situations can be interesting, but it may perhaps be useful to know a little more about the course in question before we make too many assumptions about it.  There is a brief description at the website of the University of Newcastle upon Tyne:

Folk and Traditional Music, BMus Honours.

Although it is the only undergraduate course of this kind currently available in England, it's worth mentioning that the University of Sheffield has for some time offered opportunities for postgraduate studies of a similar nature, and is likely to be offering a first degree course in the near future; details are not finalised.

I'm not going to make any value judgements at this stage, beyond agreeing, with others, that degrees (at whatever level) do not in themselves make experts; it is, however, certainly the case that most of the people I know who are involved in the academic study of tradition are also actively involved in it at a grass-roots level; something that has not been so much the case in the past.  As for the future, we will just have to wait and see.