To care for students’ physical, mental, and spiritual well-being, the Catholic Education Office encourages Catholic diocesan primary and secondary schools to implement the practice of the Examen. Through this practice, it is hoped that students can achieve the following five aims:
1. Experience tranquility and engage in self-reflection within that tranquility, allowing them to understand themselves and their emotions;
2. Learn to be grateful in all things;
3. Develop a habit of deep reflection and acquire the ability to strive for betterment through reflection;
4. Learn to be considerate of others and to co-create unity in diversity within a community;
5. Find God in all things and be willing to follow the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

To introduce this initiative to school supervisors, principals, and teachers of primary and secondary schools, a briefing session was held in the afternoon of 8 January 2025. Dr. CHU Ho-tat Matthew, an educational psychologist and lecturer at the University of Hong Kong, was invited to elaborate on mindfulness and the Examen. In addition, principals, vice-principals, and teachers from diocesan and religious order schools were invited to share their experiences of promoting mindfulness and the Examen within their schools.

Ms. CHEUNG Hiu-nam Rita, a School Support Officer from the Religious and Moral Education Section, shared her experience of implementing mindfulness at Chai Wan Kok Catholic Primary School. Sister NG Man-kin Regina, the principal of Our Lady’s Primary School, and Ms. HUI Nga-man Jasmine, a vice-principal of Wah Yan College, Kowloon, shared their experiences of implementing the Examen in primary and secondary schools, respectively.

This year’s pilot program caters to 15 schools, with plans to promote the Examen to all diocesan primary and secondary schools in four phases over the next three years.