For the 15 students from Indiana Wesleyan University who traveled to Costa Rica for a cross-cultural leadership training course last month, the collapse of construction plans ended up significantly enhancing their learning experience, IWU leadership professor Dr. Bill Millard said.

“Because of the fact that our laid in stone plans all fell through, it actually ended up making the course better for a study situation,” Millard, who led the students to Costa Rica, said. “Students really had to be involved in what we were going to do. Leadership really started to come to the forefront.”

EM staff facilitated the course by organizing basic logistics and a work project for the students. They had planned to begin construction on a 163-meter suspension bridge in the Bribri indigenous village of Soke. However, Bribri officials, having received government assistance for that bridge, asked the team to work on other projects.

The IWU students were heavily involved in deciding which projects they would work on.

“They had responsibility,” EM Executive Director Chris Clum said. “They made the decisions. We basically gave them the opportunity to kind of build the week and pursue the different opportunities. They ventured out on their own and forge some inroads that were pretty cool for them.”

Most of the students ended up working on a concrete automobile bridge, while others helped prepare the construction of a new high-school building in the village of Coroma.

Millard said the cultural immersion became complete for another group who hiked to the remote village of Alto Cuen.

According to Bribri tradition, first-time guests in a home must accept food or any other gifts offered them or they won’t be welcome in the home again. Millard said the students dutifully eight dozens of pejibaye, a starchy fruit slightly larger than a golf ball. The fruit’s taste, Millard said, is “somewhere between a potato and an artichoke.”

“When you’re done with that , you realize that was just the hors d’oeuvres,” Millard said. “Then they bring out the rice and beans.”

The students ate rice and beans - staple foods in Costa Rica, and especially on the Bribri reservation - three times a day. Millard said they planned to eat rice and beans during their final debriefing session on March 19.

Millard said the course, which gave the students one credit and satisfies the university’s cultural learning requirement, was a huge hit among students and is a go for next year.