Several years ago, SINAI Schools began planning to establish Adir Academy, which we hoped would be the nation’s first Jewish therapeutic high school for teens struggling with mental health challenges. We set ourselves on this journey after years of seeing the impact of the teen mental health crisis in our community and receiving requests for help from many families in crisis. We believed that with the community’s support, SINAI could fill this gap in the Jewish education system, as we had done for children with disabilities for decades. 

We invested significant time and resources conducting research, meeting with mental health experts, heads of school, and community leaders, and working toward establishing Adir Academy. Because opening and sustaining a school that would meet the needs of teens in mental health crisis would be a tremendous financial undertaking, we engaged in significant fundraising efforts, meeting with many philanthropists, foundations, and potential donors over several years. Unfortunately, we have not secured sufficient commitments of funds to support opening this school. Therefore, with heavy hearts, we have decided not to move forward with Adir Academy. 

We express tremendous hakarot hatov to everyone who supported and assisted this initiative. 

As SINAI Schools has done for more than four decades, we will continue to focus our efforts and resources on helping children whose needs can not be met in mainstream Jewish schools so that they can maximize their academic, social, and emotional potential.