Camryn Grawe, a third-year sustainability science major at the University of Iowa, studied abroad in the spring of 2022 on the CIEE Monteverde Sustainability & the Environment program in Costa Rica.
I am missing Central America! Since being home, things have just seemed EASY-- like everyone speaking the same language, top-notch infrastructure, etc... a little shock after three months gone. Being surrounded by nature and the KINDEST people, along with the challenge of navigating everyday life in a foreign place is what I miss most! I felt like I was always learning and growing from the locals.
Costa Rica was beautiful, and I loved getting to experience the marine/coastal regions, along with the dry forest, tropical rainforest, and cloud forest. It is crazy how so much diversity can be squeezed into a country as big as West Virginia, but it also makes sense why Costa Rica is one of the most biodiverse countries in the world. Being able to take classes solely focused on my interests and major was essential for me, and I learned so much. When we were not on long field trips, we would be on campus in classes learning about a topic, then at the end of that given week, we would do a day trip to somewhere in the community that practices that topic (for example, agriculture unit-- coffee and cacao plantations). I met some amazing people, saw crazy cool things like sloths and red-eyed tree frogs, met lots of stray dogs, got stung by a stingray, and much more!
"Being able to take classes solely focused on my interests and major was essential for me, and I learned so much. When we were not on long field trips, we would be on campus in classes learning about a topic, then at the end of that given week, we would do a day trip to somewhere in the community that practices that topic."
My classes were great, especially my Sustainability, Environment, Economics, and Society class. They were very frontloaded, so it was stressful the first few weeks. I had two professors teaching two classes each, and they were both the most incredible people. I only had eight people in my program. We did mostly field projects and partner work as well, so that was nice and took some stress off, but also helped me visually understand the content in action. The internship in the last three weeks was fun, but I would have liked to have more choices of places to work. My work at the school was exactly where I wanted to be with the given choices, and I made countless connections there and feel like I really made a difference in the whole community.
During the program, I was living on campus in a valley about a two-hour hike up the mountain to town, so the living situation was a bit isolating. We had to rely on our weekly transportation and field trips to leave campus, which gave me cabin fever sometimes, but I was lucky to have some nice hikes nearby. I loved my roommates, and our living situation was great. The staff was amazing and made us meals, cleaned, and helped us 24/7-- we did not deserve how great they were!
Monteverde itself is very small and touristy, so most people speak English, making interactions easy. There were some great restaurants, sunset views, waterfalls, and coffee in Monteverde! The ecotourism and conservation efforts there were great as well and getting to tour the hotels and volunteer at the nonprofits was such a rewarding and eye-opening experience. The town nearby was small and we pretty much exhausted all the things to do over the weekends, making trips out so much more exciting. Living in Costa Rica was such a cool experience.
