Greetings from La Cruz!

My name is Taylor Westfall and I am the current TEFL volunteer serving in La Cruz, Guanacaste. Yilena the MEP teacher, our 21 students, our team of community supporters and myself are all so excited about the start of JumpStart 2013! We are proud to have students joining us from 5 area schools around the Northwest border between Costa Rica and Nicaragua. Many of the students have been texting me over the last week, plus a few New Years day calls, expressing their excitement over the upcoming camp. I hope that during this month long camp we will be able to not only improve their English speaking, reading, and writing skills, but also open their eyes to the opportunities that English speakers can have here in Costa Rica. Here is what you can look forward to hearing about in the upcoming month: two speakers who work in tourism, several visitors from around the community, a clown performance, a day volunteering in the community, painting a mural, and some other Peace Corps volunteers visiting to help us all out. We are so grateful that our community has pitched in to donate all of the snacks for our camp and hope that this is a promising sign of their support during this next month. While I am sure some days will be crazy and exhausting, I think it will also be a rewarding experience for the students and all involved. Thanks for reading about La Cruz!