Volunteering Program
This program puts you in touch with nature and offers you not only personal satisfaction but an exciting activity, fun and the opportunity to work next to people who want to make a difference and to contribute to protect nature. This program is also designed for Academia Tica students who may register for 2 to 24 weeks. It is unpaid but the rewards last a lifetime.
Volunteering options
National Parks
Most are breathtaking natural wonders located in remote areas. Students will reside in Volunteer quarters inside the parks. Volunteers must have an open mind and be ready to help in a wide variety of duties: from trail cleaning, teaching English to park staff, turtle protection, assisting park visitors, etc.
Social Institutions
Social institutions that accept volunteers are dedicated to helping people in need. Under this program a Volunteer could work with children, women's issues, older people or another group that needs assistance in duties that range from exercising, assisting with homework, teaching, feeding to even counseling. It all depends on the volunteer's previous experience, education and his/her desire to help.
Volunteering at a farm
Volunteering at a farm consists in participating in daily farming duties in the Coronado semi-rural area. These farms specialize in any one of the following activities: dairy farming, organic farming, poultry farming, small scale pork production, flower production or one that integrates several of them. Duties vary from milking, harvesting, stable cleaning, seed planting, gardening, animal feeding and tree planting to tool or machinery maintenance.
This program is available to those students who:
- Are at least 18 years of age (if not part of a group).
- At least at an Intermediate level in Spanish.
- Enroll for a minimum of a 2 week Spanish course at Academia Tica if their Spanish level is at an Intermediate level, or for a minimum of a 4 week Spanish course if their level is at a Beginner's level prior to the commencement of the program.
- The application must be sent to Academia Tica at least 4 weeks prior to the start of the program.
Note that the actual Park will be chosen once the student meets with Park officials in Costa Rica.
Academia Tica and the community
Academia Tica is actively involved with the community of Coronado. Our philosophy of teaching is that a student should not only strive for a "Travel and Learn" but rather a "Travel and Help" concept. We collaborate with the following local social institutions (these institutions welcome any kind of help):
- Nursing home: this nursing home provides several services in an effort to rehabilitate mothers with drug problems.
- Foster home for children: receives several of Academia Tica volunteers that provide a great assistance for these needy children.
- Daytime Elders home: Academia Tica volunteer program places volunteers that help in many ways and have repaired the infrastructure of this elders' home. Since 2005 groups of youths have been visiting this place mainly during the summer.
- Nutrition center for primary school children
- Center for environmental education
- Down Syndrome Center
Urban development plan initiated by the Academia Tica
More recently a project initiated by the school in collaboration with the local municipality brought a group of urban development professionals and their students from Germany to Coronado to start an urban development plan for the county. This group came to us from the Technical University at Hamburg-Harburg. They stayed in the area, met with many local leaders and prepared recommendations in the form of a regional plan for the development options that Coronado has for the near future.
The name given to the project by the German group is: Regionales Entwicklungskonzept für den Bezirk Vázquez de Coronado, Costa Rica
