Higher Education in Costa Rica

Campaign launched for environmental university on Pacific coast By the A.M. Costa Rica staff A California-based foundation plans a world-class university with an environmental emphasis on Guanacaste's Pacific coast. The ambitious project has moved ahead because two persons donated land for a campus. The project is by The Celidon Foundation in Truckee, California. The president and chief executive officer is Rick Rantz, a dean for the Trustee center for Sierra College. Speaking of the project, the foundation said in a press release that the University for a Sustainable Future is part of the Celidon Foundation’s “grand vision” to create a sustainable world for the present generation and all future ones.

The foundation said it was embarking on a $1.5 million solicitation to raise the preconstruction costs for the university. This includes soil studies and architectural renderings, the foundation said. Rantz said in an e-mail that one donor of land is Luis Román Trigo, a member of the Asamblea Legislativa from 1994 to 1998, and that the other donor is a U.S. citizen who wishes to remain anonymous. Jane Goodall, the chimpanzee researcher, is honorary chairwoman of the board. She met with organizers last week during a visit to Guanacaste. The environmentally focused and integrated university will be dedicated to environmental, economic and social research; the development of clean and renewable technologies; and the advancement of ecoliteracy, global stewardship, innovation, creativity, and scholarly excellence, said the foundation release. The school is to be a prestigious institution that ranks among the world’s top universities and one that offers degrees through the doctoral level, said the release. The school also will use wind, solar and other clean technologies to reduce or eliminate the reliance on unsustainable energies, said the release.

Phase One of the University for a Sustainable Future will include an environmental studies and research institute, student and faculty residences, and pre-college and distance education components, all built by an institutional consortium that includes the Celidon Foundation, international universities, and pre-collegiate schools, said the release.

In a filing with the U.S. Internal Revenue Service, the foundation said it was planning a series of elementary and high schools that eventually would feed into a university. But Rantz said in his e-mail that the university is now the priority because the land was donated.There may be a later announcement of a K-12 earth-focused school in Costa Rica, he said.