Ball State University's newest study abroad program, the Costa Rica Centre, is recruiting for the Spring Semester.
Jim Coffin, director of the Rinker Center for International Programs, said the decision to start a center in Costa Rica stemmed from the university's existing centera programs in London and Australia, which are the most popular study abroad options.
"We wanted a companion piece that would be located in another area of the world," Coffin said. "One that would give students the chance to take another set of subjects and, for those who wanted to, have home-stays."
Costa Rica, a country located in Central America, is home to 850-recorded species of animals and more than 10,000 different kinds of plants, making it one of the world's most biodiverse ecosystems, according to Lonely Planet's travel Web site.
At the Costa Rica Centre, Coffin said students would have the opportunity to take courses in natural resources, biology, indigenous studies, history, anthropology and various levels of conversational and written Spanish. Professors from the University of San José in Costa Rica and a program director from Ball State will teach students in classrooms located at the Tirimbina Rainforest Center, he said.
Norman Marín Caldéron, an associate professor of Spanish at Ball State, said he would be the Costa Rica Centre's first director this spring. He will be teaching Costa Rican Life and Culture and conversational Spanish for all speaking levels.
Marín Caldéron said learning about the environment and resource management while living in Costa Rica will give students an advantage.
"In Muncie, they can study the theoretical things, but never the way they can if they see it in person," he said.
Coffin said students would also have the option to take an online course and/or an independent study with a Ball State professor.
The people at the Tirimbina Rainforest Center, especially CEO Carlos Chavarria, have been instrumental in the creation of the Costa Rica Centre, Coffin said. In October 2007, Chavarria came to Ball State to help Coffin set up a three-week field study in Costa Rica for Winter Break 2008-09.
"Carlos [Chavarria] did such a good job providing us logistics that I then discussed with him the possibility of creating a semester-long program," Coffin said.
Junior geography major Andy Goldblatt, who went on the field study to Costa Rica, said he spent three nights and two days at Tirimbina. He said the center's staff was friendly and knowledgeable, its classroom facilities were air-conditioned and equipped with technology, such as projector screens, and it was surrounded by rainforest.
"It's a bit more rugged," Goldblatt said. "You're in the rainforest even though there are nice facilities."
Goldblatt said he would like to go back to Costa Rica, but can't fit it into his schedule because of the classes he needs to take for his major.
"If that weren't stopping me, I would seriously consider doing that for a full semester," he said.
Coffin said the Costa Rica Centre is different from the three-week field study and other Centre programs because students will be living with host families.
"We think Costa Rica will be one of our most immersive Centre programs because students just get a really up-close-and-personal perspective on that country," he said.
Students will live with bilingual Costa Rican families in the town of La Virgen, which is about an hour north of San José, Costa Rica's capital, Coffin said. Students will be placed with a family based on mutual interests and how their majors relate to their host parents' careers, he said.
Host families will cook for the students, do their laundry and take them to "places of cultural interest," Coffin said. Students will also go on weekend field trips with their fellow Ball State students, he said.
Marín Caldéron said although he is from Costa Rica and goes back to visit family about once a year, he has never been to La Virgen or the Tirimbina center.
"It's more for biologists and tourists, so now I can be there as a director, and I can learn more about my country," he said. "I'm very happy and excited because I'm going to be living in a rainforest in my home country and learning new things."
Marín Caldéron said he is most excited for students to experience a new way of life in Costa Rica. "They are going to learn about a new culture and they are going to learn about life itself because in South America, especially in Costa Rica, we see life differently," he said.
Life in Costa Rica is not as much about buying things and accumulating wealth as it is in the United States, he said.
"In Costa Rica I think we are a very poor country in the sense of money," Marín Caldéron said. "We are rich in resources and natural resources, but life is not like buying things all the time, so we have different ways to enjoy life, different ways to have fun. Students are going to learn a new way of having fun; it is about sharing, it's about being with friends and it's about being creative."
Coffin said the Costa Rica Centre's $10,200 price tag is the most affordable of the three Centre programs. The price covers the cost of 12 hours of tuition, airfare, housing, food and field trips, he said.
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