Janet Mai is a senior studying Agriculture Consumer Economics. She spent six weeks of her summer studying abroad in San Joaquin, Costa Rica through the IAGE “Illinois In Costa Rica” program.
The courses that Janet had the opportunity to take were very specific to Costa Rica. The most memorable was Tropical Ecology. She found a new favorite animal when learning about the Tucán Arcoiris, and she even got the opportunity to see several in person when visiting La Paz Nature Sanctuary.
Janet’s Spanish speaking skills greatly improved while she was in Costa Rica. Communicating with her host family played a huge role in increasing her confidence in the language. Her host family experience was everything she could have wanted and she already plans on going back to visit them. She formed great connections with her fellow program attendees too, which opened the door to even more immersive experiences.
“A cool part of going on a small program is how close you get with the people you go with. In our case, we all lived with host families, who even got to know each other. My friend’s host sister took us all around San Joaquin and we all climbed a mountain together! It was really cool because I wouldn’t have had that experience without the close connection between our host families. I also loved getting to bond with locals on a deeper level, not just my host family!”