National High School Chess Championship
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Through the partnership Chicago Public Schools has with Renaissance Knights, we were able to take a historic number of students to a US Chess Federation National tournament. More than 250 CPS students from across the city had the opportunity to participate in a national tournament at no cost to them or their parents. Through a community grant we were able to provided coach busing from the schools to the Hyatt House hotel in Schaumburg which served as the base for operations; 3 meals a day that included Lou Malnoti’s Pizza; T-shirts; gift bags for each students; and much more. For many of the students this was the first National tournament they participated in.
The recent advancements made in the CPS Academic Chess Program since Academic Competition took it over in 2015 was evident at the end of this tournament. Matthew Stevens from Whitney Young was Co-Champion of the tournament scoring 6.5 out of 7.0 in the Championship section. The Whitney Young High School team came in 2nd place, only a half point behind the first place team in the Championship section.
In the Under 1900 section, Amar Jerath from Walter Payton High School tied 8th place and the Walter Payton team came in 6th place. In the Under 1600 section, the Lane Tech team came in 5th place. Robert Parkel from Lincoln Park High School tied for 4th place in the Under 1200 section. In the Under 800 section Viktor Podufalyy from Taft High School tied 4th Place while the Kinzie elementary team came in 4th place and the Skinner North team came in 6th place. In the Unrated section we had 3 students tied for 8th place; Anthony Chan and Daniel Vigo from Kelly High School, and Jackson Wildermuth from Payton High School, and the Kelly High School team came away with the 2nd place trophy.
The best part of the weekend was hearing the students’ responding “I learned” when asked how they did in their game. The motto of the CPS Academic Chess Program is I never lose. I only win or learn. The experience the students had this weekend will stay with them forever and they will have learned from this experience no matter how many points they finished the tournament with.