Fluent in chess and they have the record to prove it

Good Moves
An inner-city chess program is paying big dividends for disadvantaged children.
by WENDI C. THOMAS

The second-floor classroom at Douglass K-8 Optional School was so quiet, you could hear chess pieces slide across the board. Pairs of students were bent over chessboards, their eyes flitting across the squares as their teacher, Jeff Bulington, leaned back in his chair.

He called out moves and the students shifted their pieces to match the directions, which to me sounded like another language. But these students, most of them girls, are fluent in chess and they have the record to prove it.

Shimera Paxton, Aleha Cole, Marley Fabijanic, and Teiraney L. Biggs came in an impressive second place in the under-14 division. In the under-16 division, the team of Jerrica Randle, Christy Thomas and Jasmine Thomas also took second place.

Marley and Shimera both won a spot to compete at the Susan Polgar national tournament at St. Louis’ Webster University in July, Bulington said.

Bulington is clearly very proud of his students, who come from the middle school and the high school, which is next door. But he’s not effusive and perhaps following his lead, neither are they. I congratulate them and they smile politely. It’s as if they’re thinking: Of course, we did well at the competition. That’s what we do.

This self-assuredness and confidence isn’t in any formal curriculum, but it’s invaluable.

In his 18th-century essay, “Morals of Chess,” Benjamin Franklin remarked that “we learn by chess the habit of not being discouraged by present appearances in the state of our affairs, the habit of hoping for a favourable change, and that of persevering in the search of resources.

Full article here.