English Chess Forum

Written to Chuka Umunna (Labour - Streatham)

Chess should not be on the national curriculum. Instead chess players should seek to encourage chess clubs at secondary schools. Not that they can do much as most secondary schools are not open to outsiders running activities. By far the most effective way to encourage chess in secondary schools is...

<snip> Yes, but let's get it right. At the moment we're going about things the wrong way. If you put together a petition which was far more precise about exactly what you wanted to do and how you intended to do it I would consider signing it. The words 'on the curriculum' imply to me that it will e...

I doubt there are any in secondary school either! However I accept that by secondary school specialist teachers would probably be required as in music/art etc. Is there any reason to limit the debate to full GCSE subject or nothing? The opinion of secondary school teachers such as Neill Cooper is t...

Not at all, no. But seeing as Michael Martin started this petition, I thought it worthwhile to ask what he personally was thinking of, and what he was thinking of seems to me a non-starter. Is it? Let's examine your arguments so far: Do you consider putting chess on the curriculum more important th...

"Dear parents, this term we are offering your children the chance to take up an untried subject without properly qualified teachers. We are sure you will all rush at this exciting opportunity." But surely this equally applies to any new subjects? Are you suggesting never adding any new subject to t...

Can you just clarify, Martin: (a) at what level of education do you wish chess "added to the school curriculum"? (b) do you wish it to be compulsory or optional? (c) do you wish a qualification to be offered at the end of study, and if so, which one? I covered this slightly in a previous post. The ...

So it would have to have more than 1,227 votes to beat "refund on high bank charges". Careful. By mentioning that other petition, you might have prompted those reading this to vote for that one as well or instead of the chess one! Actually, it's not doing badly. Now just ahead of North Cyprus Recog...

A few questions: A few questions!?! Richard, you have obviously been thinking seriously about this for some time. If you put chess on the curriculum in all schools, who is going to teach it? Are you going to use professional chess teachers? If so, how are you going to find enough of them? If you ar...

Well I very much agree with chess being on the curriculum, evidence here http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Resource/Doc/930/0009711.pdf but when I went to the voting website and it asked me for far too much detail, such as my home address for instance, I smelt a rat. Also the captcha was daunting. No, tha...

"Also I know George Osborne, for one, is a chess fan. He has talked about following Kasparov & Karpov in interviews." I had not heard this before, but here he is at the London Chess Classic http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=7372 Osborne said that in an interview in The Times ... Which ...

I thought I'd take advantage of the new government e-petition thing and start a petition to add chess to the school curriculum. If we want to serious improve chess in this country, then dramatically increasing the number of children who play is no bad thing. It worked for Russia! Please sign here: h...

I thought I'd take advantage of the new government e-petition thing and start a petition to add chess to the school curriculum. If we want to serious improve chess in this country, then dramatically increasing the number of children who play is no bad thing. It worked for Russia! Please sign it here...

There is an interesting blog on this subject about someone's attempts to reach 200 http://www.londonchessplayer.com/

That is an interesting blog.

I've also come across another similar blog on reaching 200: http://www.londonchessplayer.com/