Besides the program business administration program “Talleres Empresarios Juveniles” Junior Achivement Costa Rica also provides the program “Bancos en Acción”. This program is supposed to show students how banks function/operate and teach them about finances. The previous week we were having a big event: the best teams of 14 Latin American Countries came to the Hotel Intercontinental in San Jose, Costa Rica to compete. The participating countries were: Panama, Guatemala, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay, Honduras, Argentina, Mexico, Peru, Ecuador, Venezuela, Dominican Republic, Columbia and Costa Rica.
Students in Action
On Tuesday everybody arrived during the day and after welcoming them we made an integration activity. Some of the students had to travel for 8 or 10 hours and were very tired. The next morning we started with a visit in the building of Citi Bank and listened to presentations. Citi Bank supports “Banks in Action”, including the event, financially. Afterwards we made a sightseeing tour through San Jose by bus. Everybody liked it because our guide was very entertaining consequently we had a lot of fun. In the afternoon the First Round of Competition began. The teams had to manage their own virtual bank and make profit by having the highest Bank Performance Index. Out of 14 teams only seven were able to attend the next round among Brazil, Argentina, Peru, Mexico, Uruguay, Panamá, Venezuela and Guatemala.
Fair of the Nations
At that night we were having an item on the agenda which I liked the best of all: “Feria de las Naciones” respectively “Fair of the Nations”. Each delegation had an own stand to represent their country. The students wore typical clothes and one could walk around asking and getting to know the different countries. On the stand they exposed for example a map, their flag, handicraft and typical sweets. It was very interesting and the students were open minded and explained things to me with a lot of patience.
Stand of Costa Rica
On Thursday morning there was the second Round of the Competition. For Lunch we took the delegations to “Pueblo Antiguo”. This is a little town showing how Costa Rica was build up at time of colonization. We had a typical lunch with rice, beans, fried plantains and meat. Before having dessert we watched a show with music and a lot of typical dancing. At the end they even took people of the audience to dance with them on stage.
Pueblo Antiguo
The last evening we had a delicious Gala Dinner with many prominent guests. Embassadors of represented countries, the Minister of Education of Costa Rica, the boss of Junior Achievement Worldwide, the boss of Citi Bank and many more came to hold speeches and award the prizes. Brazil made the third place at the competition. The prize of the best stand on the Fair was won by Mexico just the same as the second place of the Competition. The winner was Argentina. The prize a cheque of $1000, Congratulations! The official event ended with a Dance and a performance of drummers.
The winners of the Competition, right Brazil, left Mexico, middle Argentina
It was a great experience to be together with people from so many different countries and cultures. I just loved it and got to know a lot of new things!
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