Academy for Gifted Children

The Academy for Gifted Children is an elementary and high school in Oak Ridges (part of Richmond Hill), Ontario, Canada (12 Bond Crescent). Entrance is by a competitive examination. The school has been designed to support intellectually gifted children, and it allows children from grades 1 to GY (GY stands for Graduating Year and is basically grade 12) to enter. The Academy for Gifted Children is also called P.A.C.E., which stands for Programming for Academic and Creative Excellence.

The Academy for Gifted Children has made a modification to the usual system that Canadian public schools usually use. Rather than simply allowing the students to proceed through grades 1 to 12, the Academy has merged grades 7 and 8 into one year, as well as added an extra year after grade 12. This is to allow students to graduate with significantly more credits than those graduating from public school; however, the students graduating from P.A.C.E. still graduate at the same age.

The Academy for Gifted Children, also known as P.A.C.E. (Programming for Academic and Creative Excellence), was founded in 1993 by former Earl Haig Secondary School teachers Barbara Rosenberg and the late Dennis Reynolds, and has increased in admission since its inception.

Classes run from 9:00 AM to 3:00 PM, with 2 recesses (for elementary students) from 10:15 to 10:30 and 2:15 to 2:30, and a 45-minute lunch break at 12:00. From 3:00 to 3:45 is homework period. While it is intended for academic study, high school students are free to pursue other activities. A variety of extra curriculars are offered from 3:45 to 4:30. Popular extra curriculars include outdoor sports, computers, and origami club.

Notable Faculty
Charles Ledger, a former staff member, has worked as an educational consultant, later going on to create the Spirit of Math School- a program for mathematically-inclined students. Ledger has been awarded the Claude Watson Award (1985), the Prime Minister’s Award for Teaching (1994), and is a René Descartes Foundation Medalist (1992)..

Denis Reynolds, a founding member of the faculty, died in the year 1999, but was renowned for his dedication to education. The P.A.C.E. sporting teams are known as the P.A.C.E. Panthers and there are many other different activities such as P.A.C.E. Robotics a.k.a. the P.A.C.E. Invaders. Instruments are given out in grade 6.