On Friday, November 21, 2025, students and faculty gathered in the gym for a special Hachnasat Sefer Torah, a celebration to welcome a newly commissioned Sephardic Torah scroll to our community.

This Torah is the second Sephardic scroll ever dedicated at Shalhevet. The first was dedicated in 2018. 

The scroll was commissioned by Hamid Rashidi‑Doust and Mona Rashidi‑Doust in honor of son Nehorai Rashidi‑Doust’s bar mitzvah three years ago.

It was his decision to donate it to Shalhevet, Nehorai, now a 10th grader, said. 

“My dad wanted to fulfill one of the biggest mitzvot in the Torah which is to get a Sefer Torah written for all of his children,” Nehorai, now a 10th grader, said. “[We] gave it to Shalhevet because that’s where my future will be, and we wanted it to be somewhere special instead of in a shul, where there are many other Torahs.”

The ceremony, held on Rosh Chodesh Kislev, opened with a Sephardic-style Shacharit. The main minyan temporarily shifted to full Sephardic nusach (style), led by guest chazzan Eli Saada. The gym pulsed with singing, clapping, and what several students described as “unusually strong ruach,” as students and faculty united in celebration.

There are “nuanced differences” in observance and culture between Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews, said Dean of Student Life Dr. Jonny Ravanshenas.

“Shalhevet can be, by default, very Ashkenormic,” Dr. Ravanshenas said, “and to have a place where Sephardic students can celebrate their culture, and embrace their background, in the actual tefillah[…], for them to be able to connect to their culture is really special.”