Comments:
A charming school. It is wonderful, serene, and centering.

Comments:
A delightful experience. Everyone should have the opportunity to volunteer here.

Comments:
I came here in a desperate attempt to learn Spanish- but I have learned so much more.

Comments:
Each morning, when I arrive at school, the staff are polite, attentive and I am greeted with a smile.

Comments:
There is so much to do here, I could easily stay another week or two.

Comments:
We wish we could have stayed longer! Our home-stay family was wonderful, very friendly and helpful! We highly recommend this school!

Comments:
Excellent homestay and very friendly staff. A more organized and perhaps clearer curriculum would benifit this school greatly. Overall excellent and highly educational experience.

Comments:
My teacher was amazing! She didn't speak English, but had been teaching Spanish for nine years. I fussed and rushed to learn, because I really wanted to communicate with her, she's just that cool. All the teachers there are really friendly, interesting people and they're just opened up some crazy beach opportunity. You should check it out.

Comments:
Pros: 1) Incredible school facility, best in Antigua, hands down. Secluded, gorgeous school/courtyard... much, much better than any other school. 2) Teachers are wonderful, BUT, of course, the same teacher pool is teaching at all the schools in the small town of Antigua. This school pays slightly more, thus the teachers are a bit better than average, but the luck of the draw is the biggest determing factor at any school in Antigua. Cons: 1) The on-site school management speaks little or no English, and, frankly, are not terribly student-friendly. The two men who run the school are very interested in the friendly, attractive teachers around them, and much less interested in the students. That said, you don't need much interaction with those two, so it's not a huge drawback. 2) The rent charged for the in-school apartments are easily four times the cost of the same accomodations elsewhere, even blocks away. Home-stay prices are fine, but the in-school apartments, while cheap by American standards, are grossly overpriced... two of the apartments are wonderful, two are small and dank.

Comments:
Nous sommes restes a l ecole pour 7 semaines et notre apprentissage de la langue fut d une vitesse et dune qualite tres recommandable. L ensemble du personnel est tres gentil et toujours pret a rendre service afin d assurer un sejour agreable. Les familles d accueil (2) sont accueillante et tres chaleureuses. mes professeures aussi charmantes que professionelles ont toujours demontres un grand interet et une grande satisfaction de voir ma progression dans la langue. C est tres stimulant et motivant. le nom de mes maestras son Anna Gonzalez Arzu y Corina Valle. Les gens qui nous ont cotoyes durant notre sejour( guatemaltecas) se sont montres tres interesse et tres curieux de nos style de vie. je recommande cette ecole a tous les quebecois qui desire vivre une experience d apprentissage efficace et sans attarpes touristes.

Comments:
I think the most important factor when choosing a school should be the quality of the teachers. I was a beginning Spanish student. I knew only a couple of words in Spanish when I arrived in Antigua. My first teacher was younger than me by several years (I'm 25) and had NO CLUE as to how to teach. I learned virtually NOTHING from him. I stuck it out for 1.5 weeks and then switched to another teacher. Again, learned NOTHING from him. He had NO CLUE as to how to teach a beginning Spanish student. I am an intelligent person who has studied languages before. I went to Antigua very eager to learn and study. But my teachers were AWFUL! Antigua is also a VERY expensive place to study Spanish, AND it's really easy to speak Spanish in the evenings, as there are so many English speakers studying Spanish here and they all want to go out and party every night. Not good for practicing...you have to be really disciplined. The free Internet at this school is nice, the school garden is nice, the location is good, and I had a great homestay. But the school is overcrowded and a lot of people had VERY bad experiences with their teachers. I also know people who wanted to leave the school, but could not get their money refunded. The most important thing to know is that you can get much cheaper rates at a school once you are in Antigua. Advertised prices on the Internet are always higher than they are once in Antigua. If you really want to learn Spanish in Antigua (and learning Spanish is more important than activities or free Internet), I HIGHLY recommend the Cooperative Community of Spanish Teachers. http://www.geocities.com/escuela_coop/ I went there after my VERY BAD experience at Centro Linguistico, and had a much better teacher and a much better homestay.

Comments:
I highly recommend the school for its professionalism and its interest in its students. The teachers are highly qualified and take a personal interest in their students. I have learned a tremendous amount in the six weeks I have been here. I could never have learned this much at my home in the United States because I can use the language as I learn it. The city of Antigua is wonderful. It has many cultural activities, great restaurants, an easy'access banking system, and many shops and markets.

Comments:
I believe this is a good school for beginners or fo those who just want to practice their Spanish with someone. The teachers here do not have formal training in how to teach and so the teachers lack the structure to teach grammar. Also there áren't any standards. In other words, each teacher has their own methods, their own books, etc. My first teacher told me that his mother is a teacher and will use her book. The next teacher used some copies of materials from some book. This school simply lacks standards.

Comments:
My wife and I studied for three weeks on the immersion plan. Between us we had 7 professors, and all were very good. They made a real effort to interact and converse with us personally and engage us in meaningful conversation. CLI requires their professors to meet high standards of training and professional conduct, while granting them the freedom to use the teaching style that they think best. One thing we would do differently if we were to go again, we would have studied(?) together in the afternoons rather than each engaging a separate professor. There were so many activities, both planned by the school and of our own choosing, that our afternoons were almost always outside of the school, and one professor for the two of us would have been sufficient. Because we are at different levels, we still would choose indivivual studies in the morning.

Comments:
I guess I was comparing this school to the one I went to in Costa Rica and that was my jaded downfall, but some things at this school were totally unacceptable. First, the private room at the school in which I stayed could not have been more filthy-MOLD EVERYWHERE (the stink forced me to sleep with my head under the covers), dark, the bathroom that was communal was right outside the door so good luck getting a shower, and the curtains were a drapery of dirt and mold. The instructors have virtually no experience teaching anything and they just talk and hope you pick up one something while playing a card game. The office staff could care less about anything besides collecting your money and writing receipts. There is no sense of community with the students. I decided to only stay a week. I considered changing schools, but my interest after the first couple days was near nil. The city was awesome though-pristinely clean, people were nice, and so peaceful. I fely safer than I do in any US or European city. My advice- go to Antigua but shop around for a different school.Oh, and stay at a budget hotel, they're just as good as the mid-range hotels and half the price- and actually CLEAN. Buen suerte!

Comments:
Excellent experience all the way around. Thank you!

Comments:
I would not recommend this school, especially not if you want college credit. Go to a different school for that. 4 weeks after finishing I am still getting the run around on why my transcripts cant be sent out and I need to graduate this month. If you are going just to learn Spanish, your experience will depend on what teacher you have. I had a great teacher but she left for another job. My second teacher was awful. If you end up with Jorge, I'd switch right away. The school lets 21 year old college students teach, and that is a very bad idea. I am only 25 but the teachers should not be that young when their job is too teach adults anything. My teacher was horribly unprofessional and rude, even another teacher agreed with me on this. At first it would seem that they actually care about your experience with the weekly evaluations. But when I said I wanted to switch teachers, they didnt do anything about it and didnt even ask me what the problem was. Even in the evaluation it was clear I didnt like my teacher and they had no interest as to why. So having competent teachers is not important to them. Also my student guesthouse was a 30 minute walk from the school, not close like they make it sound like. There was construction going on at my homestay every single day for the whole 5 weeks, meaning constant noise and occasional cold showers. The school did not give a discount for this either. The school itself is nice but the staff in charge is not competent enough to run the school efficiently. Definitely go somewhere else. If you have a good teacher it would probably work out, but if you get a bad one, good luck getting that resolved and getting them to care. And they can not be depended on to provide the school credit they they offer and charge for.

Comments:
I enjoyed my week at CLI. This is a very organized school with a well-trained staff. Classes take place in the courtyard or upstairs on the patio overlooking a volcano. My professor, Rudin, was a very good instructor, well versed in teaching methods. His style was a bit harsh, and at the end of the week I thought of him as the teacher in high school who you did not like, but who you learned a lot from. However, I recommend the school highly for its professionalism and its programs. I stayed in one of the rooms at the school, which I recommend -- it was clean, spacious and had a magnificent view of the volcano. The school gets a bit dark and quiet at night, which was a bit off-putting the first few times I came back at night. The school is set a few streets away from the main part of Antigua that you will likely spend most of your time, but this was not a big problem and no more than a 5 minute walk. I definitely recommend this school and would go back.

Comments:
Professionalism of the teachers and staff combined with friendly attitude and homey atmosphere, made my stay at Centro Linguistico International an unforettable one! I would truly recommend CLI to anyone looking for good quality service at reasonable price!

Comments:
I attended CLI in the off-season (November/December). Because of this, there was enough space for all of the students to be taught around the school's beautiful courtyard. It is evident to me that if I had come in the peak season (January through March), students would have been very crowded making it hard to hear over the din of all the teaching. My teachers and I moved our table under a shaded tree in the courtyard so that we could speak to each other in quiet surroundings. If we had not been able to acquire some seclusion by moving our table into the courtyard, I would have been frustrated by having to speak over other students. I think it is a good idea to pay for classes one week at a time at any school in Antigua. Once you have given a school your money, you are not going to get it back. My first week was a let down. I had a teacher, Herber, who seemed to have a medical condition similar to Tourrette's Syndrome. He repeatedly grunted and made sounds that would be similar to someone being choked. While I think he had adequate teaching skills, his "nervios" were a distraction. After a week with Herber, the director gave me a new teacher. She was excellent! Her name was Elsa Garcia. She is worth requesting. Like all the staff, she has a photo ID. Unlike the rest of the staff, she wore a skirt that was native for her town. She is easily identifiable. The apartment at the school where I stayed smelled awful. It smelled like mold. I appreciated the hot shower so I was reluctant to move to an apartment somewhere else. If I had stayed in Antigua more than two weeks, I would have found another place to live. I think I would have liked to have had an apartment closer to the center of the town so that I would have felt comfortable walking outside after sundown. Because I was a student during the off-season, there were no school activities. There just were not enough students wanting to go places to make it worthwhile for the school to organize an outing. The staff does not speak English so it is important to come with some basic Spanish. You can communicate with the owner via email in English. He lives outside the country. Do not expect him to return your email though if you make a request for a refund!