Culture
Cultural Activities and Field Trips
Students interact with a variety of sectors of Costa Rican society including residents and business people of the capital city, members of rural communities and border towns, and even indigents of landfill shantytowns. They visit communities of indigenous groups, such as the BriBri of the Talamanca mountains, the illegal squatter settlements of the mangrove swamps along the Pacific coast, and the Afro-Caribe people of Cahuita. Visits are made to two Nicaraguan locations where students meet the survivors of civil war, local farmers, and business people striving for the socioeconomic development that their neighbors in Costa Rica enjoy.

The program gives students a chance to see development projects from an insider's vantage point. Projects include a proposed hydroelectric dam, large-scale agri-business plantations of African oil palm, pineapple, banana, and sugar cane, and industrial livestock farms. They also visit small-scale agro-forestry projects for cacao and coffee production, hydroponic greenhouses, and subsistence farms of mixed crops and livestock. If they want, students can eat the products they learn about!

The semester is filled with opportunities to experience nature, learn about conservation initiatives, and meet the activists behind them. There are excursions to national parks and private reserves spanning diverse terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems. Students visit grassroots conservation organizations, such as the Monteverde Conservation League, to learn about how conservation on a shoe-string is accomplished and how environmentalism can foster economic development. Some of the rare and endangered ecosystems that the students are lucky to experience include Monteverde's cloud forest, the Sierpe mangroves, and the Indio Maiz Reserve of Nicaragua. In addition, students visit important cultural sites, participate in local holidays, learn to cook Costa Rican food, and attend family events and community functions.