“OK Project: Lessons Learned from the End-of-Life Care” that Brings the Essence of Spiritual Care to Schools: Creating Compassionate Communities

ABSTRACT

In 2018, the OK Project was launched with the aim of sharing with children the essence of spiritual care fostered in hospice and palliative care. The project developed teaching materials, trained certified instructors, and delivered classes. By September 2023, 189 instructors were certified and a total of 720 programs delivered (202 in elementary schools, 88 in junior high schools, 25 in high schools, 78 in universities and vocational schools, and 327 in other schools) with 53,360 participants. Comments from the participants after the classes (freely written) indicated that they found support from their painful experiences, felt relieved after listening to the stories, wanted to be supportive themselves, and wanted to share what they had learned with others. As a follow-up for certified instructors, a place for certified instructors to learn from each other was regularly held online, and an environment was created where they could practice their presentations and provide feedback. OK Project has a potential to contributing to Compassionate Community because children can live in peace while embracing suffering that is difficult to resolve.