Nearly three years later, it's amazing to see how far La Escuelita de Esperanza, an after-school arts and literacy program serving Nicaraguan immigrants in Costa Rica, has come. Here's the story of how it began.

When I was working on my Master's degree in music at Rice in Houston, I decided to fly down on a cheap ticket to visit a friend of mine who was doing her internship in an impoverished community in San José, Costa Rica. I totally fell in love with the community and decided I had to come back. So, after graduating, I headed down to Costa Rica with a couple of stuffed bags full of school supplies and one contact.

The community was excited, but hadn't really believed I was coming -- so all the work that was supposed to have been done in advance and for which I had raised funds was still not finished. The classroom, which was going to be situated on the second floor of a church in the community, was supposed to be ready, and the apartment I would use was also supposed to be ready. I spent the first three weeks painting and hammering, along with some help from folks in the community. And so, in July of 2005, the program finally opened -- in a hot, windowless second floor of a tin-roofed church.

The children came, and they loved it. We had our share of run-ins with small-time gangs of boys who pickpocketed and stole, but eventually the program became such a huge part of the community that such stuff simply wasn't allowed by the community anymore. When I left the Escuelita 14 months later to pursue more graduate work, I left a strong program (serving 120 children each week), in the hands of a capable recent grad from Washington State University.

The Escuelita operates two sessions daily because the children in this community go to school either in the morning or in the afternoon. While kids have access to education, the majority of them do not make it past the third grade. The Escuelita is now under the directorship of a woman who has extensive experience with after-school programming in Brooklyn as well as ESL certification. The Escuelita now operates out of a rented house because we had to leave the church for space reasons (it was too small!). In the Escuelita, children have a safe space to learn and play, as well as get help on their homework and explore the arts.

To see pictures and for more information, go to http://laescuelitadeesperanza.googlepages.com