By Marshall Weiss, The Dayton Jewish Observer

The Miami Valley School and the Sinai Scholars program will make five scholarships available for students entering ninth grade for the 2010-11 school year. In addition, the private, nonsectarian college prep school and Sinai have approved adding a program for seventh and eighth grades this fall, for three qualified students in each grade.

The Sinai Scholarship program, a non-profit established and funded by Patti and Lee Schear, provides students accepted to the program with Jewish continuity through Judaic studies classes as part of Miami Valley’s new Religious Studies Department, and the Sinai High program every other Sunday afternoon at Sugar Camp in Oakwood.

“Sinai Scholars may also qualify for any financial assistance that makes this program achievable,” Lee Schear said.

The first five Sinai Scholars, in Miami Valley’s ninth grade, will take their first Judaics course at the school during the spring trimester.

Schear said a sixth student will join this group when it moves up to 10th grade in the fall.

The Sunday Sinai High program is open to all Jewish ninth- and 10th-grade students in the region in addition to Jewish Miami Valley School students. Currently, 16 students are enrolled. In the fall, it will also be open to all area Jewish students in grades seven through 11.

For more information about the Sinai Scholarship program, e-mail Schear at sinaischolars@hotmail.com.