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Abstract
In 2008, Costa Rica launched a national program, Costa Rica Multilingue, to improve Costa Ricans foreign language skills to meet the countrys communication demands. With English being the prominent foreign language spoken in Costa Rica, the Multilingue program focuses on English instruction and the program is commonly referred to as the National English Plan. Depending on Multilingues success, Costa Rica will consider incorporating other languages, but presently the program is focusing on English. The purpose of this research was to examine the features, issues, and implications of the Costa Rica Multilingue program. By utilizing a comparative case study approach, I examined the features and objectives of Costa Ricas National English Plan, the stakeholders that contribute to implementing the national program, the implementation issues from the perspectives of administrators and teachers who are administering the plan, as well as the perspectives from the international businesses who employ English-speaking employees. To present a holistic description of the case, I conducted interviews and observations of multiple stakeholders and sites, analyzed governmental and non-governmental documents, and reviewed photographs. In applying a critical constant comparative methodological approach with reference to human capital theory and within the context of globalization, I answered my research questions about Multilingues features and implementation issues from each of the major stakeholders perspectives. As a result, I identified five thematic findings of communication, culture, connections, commerce, and competitiveness, which reflected implications of English dominance, cross-cultural understanding, the global to local continuum, neocolonialism elements, and policy and practice issues. The significance of this case study was three-fold. First, by examining the features of Costa Rica Multilingue, the study served as a multiple site case study for other countries interested to enacting a national English plan. Second, in examining the perspectives of administrators, teachers, and corporations with the program, the study provided a variety of perspectives to understand how education reform moves from a global mandate, then to a national policy, and following that to a local community and classroom practice. Third, by learning more about the implementation issues, the study presented the difference between the policys ideal objectives and realistic practice implications.