Start College in Costa Rica on a Guided Gap Semester

• If you have applied for a CIEE program before, log into your my.ciee.org account.
• If you have never applied for a CIEE program before, press “sign up” under the “I am a new user” section.  
  • You will be prompted to create your my.ciee.org account on the next page. Please enter your name, email address, cell phone number, and create a password.  
  • Select a School: search for your current high school and press enter. Please do not enter the college you plan on attending next year.  
  • If you have a common high school name (such as Central High School), you may need to review the options with a focus on the city name.
  • Try searching using one of the keywords in your school’s name.
  • If your school is not listed: Select “My High School is not listed” from the drop-down option. Be sure to enter the full name of your high school.

Select a Program and Term: A pop-out screen will appear with the below questions. Double-check that the information displayed matches what you see on your screen: 

• Type of Program: First Year Abroad (this is CIEE’s name for a Guided Gap Semester).
• Enter your High School: Your high school that you currently attend should be displayed
• High School Graduation Year:  Enter 2025
• Where Do You Want to Go: Monteverde, Costa Rica 
  First Year Abroad and Fall 2025 should be pre-selected

Eligibility: You will see the eligibility page for First Year Abroad in Monteverde, Costa Rica. Read through the requirements and select yes to verify you meet the eligibility requirements. If you have any questions about the eligibility requirements, please contact us at fya-gya@ciee.org.  
 

• Applicants must be 18 years or older at the time of program departure, with the exception of Monterverde, Costa Rica and Kyoto, Japan, where students must be 17 or older at the time of program departure. 
• Applicants must be a recent high school graduate – no more than 18 months post-high-school graduation with a 2.7 minimum high school GPA 
• Applicants must be in their first year of college, having completed no more than one semester of college post-high-school graduation 
• Current college students must un-enroll from their academic institutions to participate in First Year Abroad, as they will be full-time, degree-seeking students at Dean College while on First Year Abroad 
• If you do not meet these eligibility requirements for First Year Abroad, you can learn more about CIEE’s other program offerings here.

• Press continue to access the First Year Abroad in Costa Rica, Monteverde application.  
• You will now see a To Do List in your my.ciee.org account with 13 tasks that need to be completed by June 1st to be considered for a Guided Gap Semester in Monteverde, Costa Rica.
• You can log in and out of your my.ciee.org account and work on your application at your own pace. Please remember to save your work as you go.