Acera School

Story

The Acera School is an independent, co-educational day school in Winchester, Massachusetts, United States, serving gifted students in grades K-8. The first school year began in September 2010 using a portion of Melrose's vacant Decius Beebe Elementary School. For the school's second year, it was renamed the Acera School and moved to the First Methodist Church's annex building.HistoryThe Acera School was founded in 2010 as the Anova School by Courtney Dickinson, a teacher, corporate executive and consultant. Dickinson was inspired by her own family's challenges in finding appropriate opportunities for gifted students in Massachusetts public schools. After a year as volunteer facilitator to try to launch a gifted education program in public schools, Courtney decided to create a school to serve high ability students who could not develop into their full potential because of too low of a ceiling in regular school programs.In the second year Acera started requiring that children take the WISC-IV assessment test as part of the admissions process. This is a precursor to a parent interview/visit. This along with attending Information Sessions have always been a part of the admissions process. In its first year, Anova opened in Melrose, leasing a portion of the vacant former Decius Beebe Elementary School building from Melrose Public Schools opening in September 2010. For its second year, the school moved to the First Methodist Church's annex building following Melrose Public Schools' decision to lease the Beebe School in its entirety to another program.In fall 2013, the Acera School re-opened for its fourth year in Winchester in its own building at 5 Lowell Avenue. The previous building owner donated back $100,000 towards the school, and this along with a few families' donations made up a down payment for the building's purchase. A mortgage loan was secured from Winchester Cooperative Bank. The school started offering an after-school program in its second year, and its after school enrichment programs are now open to students not enrolled at Acera during the school day.