Amistad Institute is a truly dreadful language school. DO NOT go there. I booked a Beginnners Spanish 4-week intensive course which started in October 2012. Their website advertised that the school was in the centre of Heredia, Costa Rica but it is 10k from from there located in a tiny village. It takes anything up to 50 minutes to get into the city by bus. There is nothing to do up here whatsoever. The website promised various weekly afternoon classes, but these never materialised during the first week. The place is badly run with no information on noticeboards. When I asked the staff about afternoon classes nobody knew anything. My first homestay was a disaster - the woman was clearly not interested in talking to me and it was obvious she was only doing it for the money. She gave me rice and beans for every meal. I moved to another homestay after 2 days. In the classrooms there are small hard wooden chairs, the type that you used to get in junior school in England 30 years ago. The teaching consists of the teacher standing talking 'at' you; there is no role play; pair work; audio/visual delivery; little conversation between the students. In every class I have taken we had to sit for 4 hours (with a short break) whilst the teacher did most of the talking. I was expecting to learn Spanish for use in practical situations. The standard of teaching has been truly dreadful - I know, I am a qualified English teacher. I decided to leave 2 weeks early as I can't stand the place any longer.I am currently in argument with Amistad Institute in order to get my money back. If they don't agree to a refund I shall be taking them to court for misrepresentation. They are an utter disgrace and should not be allowed to operate.
Amistad Institute
With the program offer by Amity Institue you can spend one year teaching your language in USA.
For me was a great experience not only becouse I could meet so many people and learn about the american culture also becouse I learn so many English.
The host family was just amazing and the experience was totally advisable.
You just need to pay for your flight and thats it, you can live one year in the US
My husband and I have studied Spanish and the Costa Rican culture at Amistad Institute for the second time. We have now taken two four week courses and our Spanish is at the conversational level. The teachers were excellent and very helpful. The accommodations were generous with a great view and friendly people, reasonably priced. AI has a private reserve that functions as its' campus full of plants and wildlife situated on a beautiful river. Two classes we really enjoyed were the Latin dancing and Food preparation. Some of the fruits at the food class were amazing and now I know what to look for at home. Although we are older and most of the students were young we had a delightful time! Would recommend this organization to anyone of any age. Jane Kazaros, Virginia
I wanted to share my experience with Amistad Institute and their wonderful team. It was truly impressed by the attention we received and how inclusive they were of all of our needs during our stay. We were a party of 6, traveling with my children (middle school) and my mother (a senior). What impressed me the most was the programs are designed to cater to all ages.
My mother enjoyed her visits to the noteworthy art galleries, historic sites and museums. She was very impressed with their information and advice on how to retire and invest in Costa Rica. My children really loved the Kids program and the fun curriculum really encouraged and inspired my children. The method is really immersion based, so they were not only quick to learn, but also to retain the basic language skills. The way the material was presented was fun, interactive and kept them engrossed and engaged.
And as for myself - I had a wonderful time refreshing my language skills after a long period away from Central America. It was so inspirational and rekindled my love for the country, and I especially loved the Latin Culture and Sports Lovers programs.
All in all, we have 6 very satisfied visitors that wish to thank Amistad and their wonderful hosts, staff, teachers and family. It was a pleasure to interact with and be welcomed by such an energetic, knowledgeable and awesome group of people who clearly love doing what they do. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!!!
I just spent 2 weeks in Costa Rica at Dominical Beach.
I was told by GoEco (who turned out to be the middle man) all about the program... this is obviously information they were receiving from Amistad. I was told about the work I'd be doing, such as doing maintenance and nightly beach patrols in shifts. None of this information turned out to be true. We did pick up some drift wood.. some days. And we were never directed to do it, we'd just get up in the morning and go. We also hardly did beach patrols. One of the directors was supposed to stop by and pick us up each night but, after the first night, she never showed up. The girls who had been there before us said that the director showed up sometimes for them, but if there was any rain she wouldn't (which happens a lot this time of year). So once again we would, undirected, do for a quick walk on the beach each night. I'm certain that this lack of directed walks is the reason we didn't see a single turtle egg. Basically, we didn't do much work at all, even though I was told I would. This means either Amistad isn't gathering enough information about the project or they are lying to GoEco about it.. either way they are not correctly doing their job.
Furthermore, I was told in an email from Amistad that the water would be perfectly fine to drink at the project site. After arriving at the site we went and visited the waterfall.. we were told by a local that this is directly where the water came from for the town. The water was absolutely not safe to drink. As well, the man who was looking after the house we stayed in told us directly not to drink it. It's safe enough for locals to drink, but not visitors. This forced all the volunteers to purchase water from the local store every single day. This was money that could have been easily avoided if Amistad had included this in the contract they had with the home owner regarding food purchases. Juice was included, yet water wasn't.
Our orientation happened to occur on Mother's Day in Costa Rica. Turns out that this is a very important holiday. Yet, GoEco was unaware of this because Amistad failed to tell them... had I known that it was a holiday and we weren't going to be doing anything I would have booked my flight for later in the weekend.
As well, they didn't tell us anything about getting to the project site until we asked. Then they told us to get off at the very last stop of the bus and that it would be impossible to miss.. had we of followed their directions we would have ended quite far away from our project site. Luckily enough one of the volunteers was paying enough attention to notice we were in Dominical so this must be where we got off. When we got off there was nobody around to meet us and when we asked locals about the turtle project nobody had any idea what we were talking about. We then happened to meet another couple volunteers who brought us to the house. A couple people I was with also did not receive enough money to pay for the bus to the project and so had to pay out of their own pockets... after being completely confused by the bus driver telling them they were short in spanish.
Overall, I would not ever travel with Amistad. And I had it lucky... I met other people who had an absolutely terrible experience (such as showing up to their project site and finding there's actually no project there...). And no, Amistad, just because I'm writing a bad review does not mean I'm somebody from a competitor. I really did volunteer through Amistad and I really did hate them. Loved the location... but I could have just as easily went on vacation and gone for a stroll on the beach... and for cheaper than I paid.
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