For more than five miles, students of the Pacific Buddhist Academy walked alongside Buddhist ministers in a Bodhi Day Walk for Peace this week in which they encouraged each other to finish the course and got to converse outside the formal trappings of a temple.

The venture started out as a way for the 14 Oahu ministers of the statewide Honpa Hongwanji Mission of Hawaii to show their support for the academy’s plans to expand its classrooms, but it became a symbolic pilgrimage to pay homage to the school’s mission of “nurturing mindful and compassionate human beings,” said the Rev. Richard Tennes.

Academy Director Pieper Toyama said school on Thursday was “on pause that day” as the entire student body of 59 and academy faculty helped with manning refreshment stations, making lunch or taking part in the walk. They started from Moiliili Hongwanji Mission at 6:45 a.m. and ended up three hours later, greeted by cheering, sign-waving children and temple members at the Jikoen Hongwanji Mission in Kalihi Valley, he said.

The walk also coincided appropriately with Bodhi Day, held every year on Dec. 8, the day Buddha attained the enlightenment that spawned a worldwide religion more than 2,000 years ago.

“The school’s mission is peace education, as peace is one of the values of Buddhism. It’s our centerpiece besides being a college preparatory academy,” said Toyama, who summed up the mood of the pilgrimage as “exhilarating.”

Academy sophomore Megan Viloria said, “It was really inspiring that we had all the reverends, even Bishop (Eric) Matsumoto. It was very exciting. We cheered each other on — it was really motivating. The walk was sort of difficult, pretty long. When people started falling behind, we split into two groups, a faster and slower group.”

Viloria said she got to talk with Tennes and Matsumoto, and “the way they spoke was very heartfelt. They said everyone was doing such a great job and we should do this more and more to help our school keep growing.”

Koki Atcheson, a freshman, said the students decided to join the walk “to make sure they knew the school supported them.” She said one of the ministers told her that although they were tiring, “having the youth there helped them keep up the pace. It was a real feeling of community.”

When junior Sam Sueoka heard the ministers were organizing the event because the school needed extra help in raising funds, he thought “it was really nice that they (the ministers) did it without the school asking.” He got to “talk story” with Tennes and the Rev. Sol Kalu about their training to become ministers, Sueoka said, adding that the academy has come to represent an extended family to him.

Toyama said students also collected donations, and the ministers managed to raise about $6,000 from their congregations the month before the walk began. Funds will go toward a $5 million capital campaign to construct classroom facilities and a science lab next year that will allow the academy to double its enrollment to 120 students. More than $3 million has already been raised, and the project should be completed by the end of 2013, he added.

“The students had a lot of time walking and talking with the reverends. They said, ‘It’s great; I’m getting a lesson talking about Buddhism.’ For me it was touching for the ministers to be so visible, so physical, to be a part of it. We were walking for what we believe will happen in the future. For me and the faculty, we realized we need to do a very good job because they have such great faith and commitment,” Toyama said.