Whosear wrote:
They have a decent ed system (declining as they try to emulate the US higher education system).
Whosear,
"Declining" My friend. In my opinion if it declines anymore it will be non existant! The Costa Rica politians do a fantastic job of promoting their 'great' educational system!! Yes a very high percentage of the people are 'literate' if you call reading on a second grade (USA) level 'literate'. And, yes, compared to their neighbors to the north, they are better educated, BUT!!!! Spend a day in a public school here--I have several times! The schools are extremely over crowded, they go to school for, at most, a half a day; the noise level both in the classroom and outside is almost always unbearably loud; K*ds come and go from the classroom as they wish; the teachers would, for the most part, not even be qualifyed to be a teaching assistant in the USA; they are extremely underpaid and over worked; and teaching aids (projectors, computers, books, maps, etc) found in every classroom in the USA are essentially non existant. And most of the school buildings are in very poor condition. Yes they say they have 'free' school for ALL, but for the poor that is a joke. No uniform-no school; no money for supplies(most of which are supplied by the schools in the USA)- no school; And if the family does not have the money for the things needed, WHO CARES? NO ONE!!! The Ch*ld just does not go to school; and I am talking about Ch*ldren even in kinder.
The only Ch*ldren getting a decent education in Costa Rica are the lucky ones whose families can afford to send them to priviate schools--and that is a very very small percentage of the students!! Thus with every generation the number of very poor goes up and the number of middle class and above goes down. One of the things I have found really strange: they say they teach English in the public schools here!! Out side of some "working chicas' who are self taught, how many people who went to public schools in CR have you seen who can speak English?? How can a teacher who speaks no English teach students English
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Old and retired but still bang, and bang, and bang!!!