The 1st International Conference on the Applications of Chess and Education will take place in Buitrago de Lozoya from June 25th to June 29th at the GSD Buitrago Campus.

It will be organized by the Gredos San Diego Cooperative and by the National Distance Education University (UNED). A International School Chess Tournament, subject to official ELO rankings, will take place simultaneously.

The 1st International Conference on the Applications of Chess and Education will begin with addresses by Susan Polgar, José Antonio Marina, and Leontxo García.

Gredos San Diego Cooperative and the National Distance Education University believe in the educational role of chess as a tool to teach thinking, and are proud to recognize Spain as a leader in socially applied chess.

With this vision in mind, the conference will include international speakers at the forefront of the field. Gredos San Diego and the UNED are confident that the event will be a turning point for the recognition of chess as an educational tool.

The Conference will be led by Leontxo García, FIDE Master, journalist, and researcher, together with Maria José Albert, PhD in Educational Science with a degree in Psychology, Assistant Dean of Postgraduate Studies and psycho-pedagogical specialist at the UNED, and author of the book Educational Research (La Investigación Educativa).

The Conferences, workshops, and round tables will be guided by distinguished persons including José Antonio Marina, Susan Polgar, Juan Blanco, Juan Antonio Montero, Joaquín Fernández Amigó, Pep Suárez, Adriana Salazar, Ramón Aciego, Joaquín Pérez de Arriaga, Daniel Escobar, José Ángel López de Turiso, Juan Carlos Antón, and Anna Rudolf.

Participants may register at www.chesshelpsyouthink.com, where a complete schedule for the Conference and Tournament, information on fees, and contact details to request more information may be found.

The program is designed in such a way that all participants may provide their comments and ideas both during the Q&A sessions following morning conferences and in the workshops and round tables in the afternoons. All participants will receive two academic credits from the UNED.

International School Tournament, open to boys and girls and subject to official ELO rankings, will be held alongside the Conference. The tournament will include categories from SUB 8 to SUB 18 and will be arbitrated by Luis Blasco de la Cruz, a national senior chess coach and international arbiter.

Younger participants staying on the GSD Campus will enjoy a fun cultural program focused on getting to know the area, as well as Spanish cinema and cuisine. Accompanying adults will have the option of attending the round tables and the opening and closing speeches of the Conference.

GSD Buitrago is a comfortable, all-inclusive, and modern facility perfect for relaxing outside of conference hours.

Gredos San Diego Cooperative

The Gredos San Diego Cooperative of Madrid is a educational enterprise owned and operated by the employees themselves based on a cooperative model, and dedicated to social responsibility and the provision of a public service while maintaining the efficiency of a private company.

Gredos San Diego was founded in 1985 by a group of 19 employees who assumed ownership of the school in anticipation of the owner, D. Julio López Herrero’s retirement.

The Gredos San Diego Cooperative currently employs over 1,300 individuals, both teaching faculty and staff, of whom 925 are cooperative members, making it the largest non-tertiary educational institution in the Community of Madrid with a 5% market share, and the largest Spanish enterprise dedicated to the model of social economics.

On May 2nd 2010, GSD was honored with the Medalla de Plata by the Community of Madrid for its “work in developing educational systems

The Gredos San Diego schools are secular with a vision of fostering tolerance and freedom of thought while instilling educational values based on respect for human dignity and promoting interest in research and discovery both in the sciences and the humanities.

The Cooperative currently operates seven schools in the Community of Madrid. The Gredos San Diego School of Alcalá is operated through a collaborative agreement with the Educación Activa Complutense cooperative, under the same GSD management model.

Gredos San Diego also has two Nature Classrooms: the Milky Way Nature Classroom in Casavieja (Ávila), and the Sendas del Riaza Nature Classroom in Valdevacas de Montejo (Segovia).

These projects serve dual functions of providing education oriented toward respect for the environment, and promoting local development.

Over the course of 28 years, the Gredos San Diego Cooperative has achieved the objectives with which it was created and has risen to new challenges with the creation of the GSD Cooperative Group, designed to generate initiatives within the framework of social responsibility. It is the largest cooperative in the Community of Madrid and one of the few currently operating in Spain.

Chess Daily News from Susan Polgar
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