Despite significant evidence indicating its effectiveness in meeting the needs of academically gifted students, academic acceleration is not a popular provision in New Zealand schools. The literature suggests that parents and educators fear that removing students from their same-aged peers will damage their social-emotional development, although the available evidence does not support these concerns. A mixed methods approach was used with 29 male students from a single-sex secondary school to explore the impact of acceleration in this study. All participants were simultaneously enrolled in secondary school and undertaking a variety of first-year courses through a local university. The participants completed the "Piers-Harris Children's Self-Concept Scale" 2. An analysis of the responses indicated no significant differences, other than physical self-concept, with normed mean age equivalent scores. In a follow-up interview with five of the participants, a sense of belonging to the school and the acceleration programme was identified. The questionnaire and interview findings indicated that the accelerated participants generally felt comfortable with their identity as accelerates, while also feeling accepted by their non-accelerated peers. The conclusion was reached that acceleration may be a positive provision for gifted students in New Zealand that does not negatively impact their social-emotional development.