HONOLULU, HAWAII, May 15, 2002: The Pacific Buddhist Academy will open its doors in August of 2003 and will offer Buddhist education from pre-kindergarten through Grade 12. Under the umbrella of the Honpa Hongwanja Mission of Hawaii, the school presently offers education for pre-school through the eighth grade. With a US$1.5 million contribution from church headquarters in Kyoto, the academy will focus on a peace curriculum with the integration of Buddhist values of compassion and community service. Temple president Mary Tanouye says, “It will be peace as a subject and peace as a way of behaving. We will have teachers who are imbued in the teachings of Buddhism.” In collaboration with the Spark Matsunaga Institute for Peace at UH and the United Nations Peace Project, the academy wants to produce a faculty team similar to the system used at universities. The Buddhist school has a long history in Hawaii. It first started in 1902, was closed during World War II, but in 1949 it opened its doors to elementary age students. In 1994, the school was able to offer a curriculum up to grade eight. Hindus could use this model to start creating Hindu schools across the nation.
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