A CELL Classroom

Just another day of learning. NBD.

Program Overview

Travel with us to beautiful Costa Rica and Nicaragua and explore the principles of “Sustainability Through Community.” Learn from inspiring people and organizations demonstrating the best practices in conservation and environmental management. Participate in sea turtle conservation, build a solar power system, and live at a sustainable eco-lodge/farm. Go beyond study abroad in Central America with CELL!

Current Central America Programs

  • Program Dates: This semester program is currently a custom program built around your group’s attendance dates.
  • Length: 12 weeks
  • Credits: 15 credits through Lesley University or one of CELL’s direct credit partners
  • Cost: $14,900 USD, plus airfare from your hometown
  • Courses: contact CELL for a full syllabus. Click here for course descriptions.
    • Language, History, and Culture of Costa Rica and Nicaragua (LINTD 2003)
    • Sustainability: Secrets of Simplicity (LINTD 3699)
    • Human Ecology: Humans and Their Environment (LINTD 3700)
    • Service-Learning: Sustainability Through Community (LINTD 3707)
    • Crossroads Thinking Skills for the 21st Century (LINTD 4003)
CELL’s Custom Abroad Programs are the perfect supplement to your curriculum! We’ll work with you to craft a unique field experience for your students – one that balances academic standards with hands-on experience in some of the world’s most interesting countries and with leading sustainability focused organizations like Ashoka, Heifer International, Friends of the Earth, Northwest Earth Institute, Solheimar Eco-Village, and others. Our Custom Abroad Programs are a variation of our traditional study abroad programs. The key difference is that you get to participate. The dates are set by you and when your group would like to attend.  Learn more.

More Details

Are you interested in learning the principles of sustainability though community from some of the most inspiring development organizations in Central America? If so, come join us for a life-changing adventure. What will you do? A lot! A sample of a few activities:

  • Live, study and work alongside inspiring, passionate people who have committed their lives to making our planet a more environmentally sustainable, socially just, and healthier and happier place to live
  • Learn Spanish while in class and while visiting with your Central American host family during homestay portions of the program (no previous Spanish language study needed)
  • Learn the principles of sustainable community development while building a solar collector or drip irrigation system or simple biodigester or solar oven
  • Learn about unique issues communities are facing and how they are working together to resolve them
  • Learn about tropical ecology and how we can design sustainable human systems patterned after nature as architect
  • Hike to the top of a volcano or through a tropical rain forest or to the top of a mountain to observe bird migrations
  • Swim in the beautiful, warm waters of the Atlantic and/or Pacific
  • Come open your heart and mind to being changed forever.

Grupo Fenix

Grenada

Selva Negra

Mariposa Language School

San Jose

Kekoldi

Sea Turtle Restoration

ASOPROLA

Our Partners in Central America

Grupo Fenix

Grupo Fenix works with communities in Nicaragua to promote renewable energy, reforestation and sustainable development.

Mariposa Language School

La Mariposa is a small, friendly non-profit Spanish school and eco-hotel, just outside the pueblo of La Concepcion, Nicaragua (Central America).

Kekoldi

Kekoldi is a sustainable development organization located in the rainforest of the Talamanca region.

Selva Negra

Selva Negra is a sustainable coffee plantation and one of the world’s inspiring ecological farms.

Asociasion ANAI

Asociacion ANAI is a Costa Rican sustainability organization which has pioneered some of the tropical world’s most successful community-based, sustainable-development practices.

ASOPROLA

ASOPROLA integrates the work of men, women, youth and children in project implementation to ensure sustainable development and diversification of productive activities committed to environmental protection, rescuing values ​​and culture.
“This CELL program has rekindled my ambition to improve the health of our ecosystem as well as given me an action plan with steps I am going to take when I return home to begin living more sustainably.”
Jonas Borkholder (Paul Smiths College)

CELL Central America