November 2005 Newsletter

Fall Semester in Ecuador

Greetings from Cuenca! Our Fall Semester sudents continue to explore and enjoy the diverse aspects of life and culture in Ecuador. They are now considered the sons and daughters of their host families and have participated in numerous excersions around the country. In mid-October the students visited the extraordinary El Cajas National Park, where they experienced altitudes of 9,700-13,500 feet and admired some of the 400 lakes and lagoons scattered throughout the park. The next week, after a demonstration of an Andean shamanism cleansing, the students decended altitude into the Oriente region of the Amazon Rainforest. There they met people of the Shuar indigenous group, hiked through the jungle, visited a Shuar radio station, and splashed and swam in a number of beautiful rivers.

This week the students have just begun their service learning project. They are working in a daycare center that serves low-income families, many of whom have migrated to Cuenca from other regions looking for work. Some of the projects the students are working on include reconstructing a dilapidated playground, painting murals, creating a vegetable garden, and of course playing and sharing with the children.

In addition to the more experiential learning of travel and service at the daycare center, the students have been hard at work in their second round of classes. With their improving spanish skills they are tackling more advanced projects in classes such as Indigenous Literature and Culture, Spanish American Civilization, Cross Cultural Communication, and the TV News Practicum.

Last but not least, this week the students have the opportunity to observe and participate in the traditional festivities of the Day of the Dead and the independence of Cuenca.

Visit: http://www.cedei.org/cuenca/programs/fall/ to read more.

Medical Spanish in Ecuador
Our Medical Spanish in Ecuador program is accepting enrollments for our May and August programs. Designed to give medical students and
professionals the capacity to communicate with Spanish-speaking patients, this program is intensive with 4 hours of high-quality Spanish instruction every morning. To supplement the classes and provide students with a broader sense of health and medicine in Ecuador, we will be visiting clinics, hospitals, have a Shamanism presentation, and visit a small community to learn about rural health challenges. Students will live with the families of medical professionals during their stay. For more information please visit:
http://www.cedei.org/cuenca/programs/spanish/medical.php
While this program is designed for any level of Spanish, we recommend that beginning Spanish speakers try to take some Spanish prior to enrolling in the Medical Spanish program so that they can easily apply their new medical vocabulary. An ideal option is to enroll in our Full Immersion Spanish
Program (http://www.cedei.org/cuenca/programs/spanish/fisp.php) for a few weeks before joining the program. CEDEI provides a strong Spanish base as well as activities such as salsa, music and cooking classes. This background will prep you for travel opportunities during and after the Medical Spanish program in the Galápagos, the Amazon and in Ecuador?s finest markets!

Intersession
We are excited to be having a great group of students come from Saint Ambrose University and Salisbury University for our Intersession Program that runs from the end of December through January. The program is filled with amazing trips to Quito, to the indigenous town of Otovalo with a vibrant and colorful market, to Cajas National Park, and to the best preserved Incan ruins in Ecuador, Ingapirca. In addition to those expeditions, the students from Salisbury University will get to explore parts of the Ecuadorian coast and the indigenous community of Principal, as well as participate in a three day volunteer activity of renovating a low-income daycare center. The academic opportunities abound for both groups, including classes on Psychology, Latin American Women?s Issues, Nursing, Social Work, and Diverse and Culturally Responsible Education. We will be using Ecuador as the classroom to fully take advantage of this experience.

Spring Semester in the Andes
This January we will, once again, be hosting our Spring Semester in the
Andes program (cosponsored by St. Ambrose University) ? with a twist. This program, which always had excellent travel opportunities, now is going to South America?s two most unrivalled sites: the Galápagos and Machu Picchu. Students will be accompanied by qualified professors and guides on all field trips, enhancing their classroom learning by applying studies to the field and the communities around them. Our Spring semester offers classes in public health, environmental studies, business, Spanish grammar, culture and literature, political economy, Latin American art, Quichua, service-learning and more! And, like all of our programs, students will live with local families and become part of the Cuenca community. There are still opportunities to apply for the program, but space is filling up quick so apply now to ensure a spot for yourself at: www.cedei.org/cuenca/programs/semester/



Individual Students
We continue to have a steady flow of unique and inspiring individual
students -- from Montreal, Boston, Switzerland and Germany this month. Many students opt to join CEDEI?s full immersion program for a few weeks (or sometimes a few months) before embarking on cross-country South American travels. Taking intensive one-on-one tutorials at CEDEI is an ideal way to prep yourself for independent travel. Teachers are diverse and talented and are active people in the community. With the help of language teachers students have joined bands, learned about local development efforts, and have enjoyed the less concrete benefits of chatting about globalization, philosophy, reincarnation, indigenous culture, and Ecuadorian chocolate in their conversation classes. There is something for everyone ? including guitar lessons, salsa classes, travel to Incan ruins and opportunities to volunteer and intern. Write us and tell us what you?d like to do! (info@cedei.org)