By Raúl Gavarrette O.
By the end of the 90´s Nicaragua experienced a boom as the new and hottest destination for tourism in Central America, the country became an attractive potential for investors, and entrepreneurs. North American classic restaurants franchises opened in Managua, capitol of the country.
Part of that boom, was the language schools Project in 1997. In that year, Professor Paul Martin from the United States and Professor Raúl Gavarrette from Nicaragua, opened the first Nicaragua Spanish Schools network (NSS). Since the beginning NSS intended to be an international agency for representing and marketing the few already established Spanish schools in Estelí, Managua, Granada and Laguna de Apoyo. NSS agreed with the Spanish schools to open an office in the United States and a branch in Nicaragua to represent them.
Due to many facts this initial enterprise was unsuccessfully and later on, the NSS team decided to open their own Spanish language schools in San Juan del Sur, Granada and León. That is when in 1997 they started the first Spanish language school in lovely San Juan del Sur. The language school was named San Juan del Sur Spanish School. There was not any Spanish language school before. The first Director was María Dolores Silva, a certified and experienced high school Spanish teacher from San Juan del Sur. That school was located in the Escuela Integral de Cultura right in front of the beautiful bay. The former Spanish instructors were Carmen Rizo, Carmen Victor, Rosa Silva and Marta Calderón. Since that same year, Professor Raul Gavarrette, NSS Executive National Coordinator started continuous training workshops in administration and management of the school, excursions arrangement, and language teaching technique workshops of Spanish as a second language. The Spanish school staff was trained for the first wave of students who was coming in January 1998.
The first group of high school students from the United States brought by NSS in the same year 1998, made the team to priories and to work on organizing and opening the Palacio de Cultura Spanish School in Granada students.
Weekly workshops about techniques for the teaching of the Spanish as a second language were organized by NSS Executive team for the new Spanish language instructors at the school in San Juan del Sur and Granada.
The following years after foundation of San Juan del Sur Spanish school, were successful for all the Nicaragua Spanish Schools network. The number of instructors increased as more students would come. At the end of that year Raul Gavarrette the Executive Director left the NSS and moved to Costa Rica where he started working for Abroad International Programs run in both countries Costa Rica and Nicaragua.
After many years of being the strongest language program in Nicaragua NSS disbanded in 2006 due to many intern conflicts with their massive instructors who wanted somehow independence and wanted to start their own business in the Spanish school new industry. That was the origin of all the spinoff schools in San Juan del Sur, Granada, and Leon. Playas del Sur Spanish school, was the first spinoff Spanish school in San Juan del Sur. That was the first wave of spinoffs schools in town. Then, Escuela Nicaraguita (2006) managed by the former Director of San Juan del Sur Spanish school NSS María Dolores Silva. Escuela Nicaraguita did not have such success and closed in 2007; Casa Escuela Rosa Silva and Ruben Dario Spanish School also opened in 2006. Other new program called San Juan del Sur Spanish School started operation managed by Verónica one of the former instructors at the former NSS network.
The second wave came in the following years after 2006, other Spanish schools were founded in San Juan del Sur caused by the boom: Lago Azul Spanish school, by the bay, managed by Jenny; Big Foot Spanish School in Tola, led by Juan Delgado (2007), currently Pie de Gigante Spanish School which offers Spanish lessons and surfing; the Spanish corner in San Juan del sur downtown opened in 2007, managed by Christian Rodríguez; Spanish Ya School founded by Jahaira Jiménez (2008), and Latin American Spanish School founded by Vanessa Granados (2008).
Every single of the former Spanish instructors wanted to have their own Spanish school as they saw business opportunities in this industry. APC´s Spanish Schools managed by the Asociación de Promotores de Cultura also started school programs in León, Granada and San Juan del Sur. They wanted a piece of the cake, too.
The language school’s industry was seriously affected in hubs like Granada, Masaya, and San Juan del Sur where a couple of Spanish schools closed permanently. At present it seems that the strong Spanish school’s boom of the 90´s in Nicaragua has seriously decreased and has reached a stage where some of the owners have considered closing schools, and try other business. International high price of oil has caused an increasement of flights ticket cost, and it is one of the facts for which a few travelers are coming not only to Nicaragua but to other Central American countries. No new schools have opened in Nicaragua since 2022. At the date of posting this information, these are the Spanish language schools currently in operations in San Juan del Sur and around:
SAN JUAN DEL SUR
Lago Azul Spanish School
Spanish Corner
Veronica´s Spanish school
Spanish Ya
Latin American Spanish School
PLAYA GIGANTE, TOLA
Pie de Gigante Spanish School
