Spotlight: Robert Katende, Coach of the Queen of Katwe

What do you call the coach of a queen?

This week’s Chess4Life Spotlight guest Robert Katende is just that. He was the coach of Phiona Mutesi, the “Queen of Katwe” (you can even see Robert in the Disney film!). Though Phiona may be Robert’s most well-known student, he has impacted many other lives as well. His organization has helped over 25,000 children!

Robert believes that “everyone has a seed of excellence that needs to be nurtured to harness their God-given abilities” and he believes that chess can help provide that nurturing. Robert and his team use chess as a platform to set kids on a meaningful life trajectory. Even having tangible goals (like chess goals) to dream for and work for can help these children tremendously in life. 

Chess affords children the opportunity to develop the inner belief that they are problem solvers. This self-knowledge can give them the confidence to make it in life. Robert also sees the numerous academic benefits of chess and how it helps develop essential thinking skills. Overall, chess allows for the transformation of mindset, which Robert believes is one of the first steps in learning.

Now he aims to open a school servicing 800 children per year. Check out the full article here!

Spotlight: Filling Gaps in the Chess World with Randy Kaech

Randy Kaech once directed a tournament where Walter Browne, six time U.S. Champion, played. Knowing this fact from his adulthood, you might never guess he once had no idea there was a broader world of chess.

Randy grew up in a small town in a rural area of Southwest Washington. As a child, he watched his uncle and his uncle’s Navy friends play chess. From watching them he figured out how the pieces move and eventually how checkmate works. His uncle and the Navy friends let him begin playing with them. Due to Randy’s rural location he quickly discovered that there was not much chess competition around.

In middle school, Randy played at a tournament at a local community college. The youngest player there, he won and then promptly quit chess because he thought there was “no one left to play.” He had no idea just how wide the chess scene was!

Check out the full article here to learn more about how Randy discovered the rest of the chess universe and his committed involvement now helping other rural kids get connected to the benefits of chess.

Spotlight: Chess Impacting STEM Careers with Bruce Kovalsky

It’s easy to see that Bruce Kovalsky has had a successful career in the STEM industry from even a quick glance at his resume. He’s been a senior manager and senior engineering specialist at places like Boeing and IBM and has now been taking a well earned sabbatical since July 2022. 

His successful chess career is equally apparent. Bruce became a National Chess Master in 1984. He shared that he learned chess from his grandfather when he was five or six years old and started playing in chess tournaments in middle school with his older brother. In the beginning that sibling rivalry motivated Bruce to keep studying but even after he surpassed his brother he fell in love with the game and continued to play.

In his recent interview with Chess4Life founder Elliott Neff, Bruce highlighted some key parallels he saw between his STEM career and playing chess, and discussed why it has been so important to him to volunteer hours of his time to help others learn the game. Check out the full story here!

Spotlight: Chess Skills as Successful Business Skills with Jim Egerton

This week’s Spotlight guest is Jim Egerton, owner and founder of Business on the Board, a talent development company that accelerates employees’ mastery of critical business skills through the game of chess in the corporate world. Jim believes that chess leads to better thinking, better thinking leads to better decisions, and better decisions lead to better results. In fact, Jim wrote an article on six chess skills that increase tech company profits - you may be surprised by some of them!

Jim first started playing chess as a sophomore in high school in the western suburbs of Chicago and his interest developed quickly. Soon after, a chess coach approached him about starting a chess club (which is still around to this day!). 

After obtaining a mathematics degree and having a successful corporate career, Jim decided to start his own company, Business on the Board. Since he experienced the benefits of chess personally and the impact these benefits had on his career, he wanted to share them with others.

Jim maintains that these benefits are available to anyone, whether you are an avid lifelong chess player or not. Check out the full article here to learn more!

Spotlight: Parenting Through Chess with Ken Lee

Ken Lee, Vice President of Michael Wiese Productions (the number one publisher in the world for books for indie filmmakers and writers), has been playing chess with his 10-year-old son. Or it may be more accurate to say that much of the time he is learning chess from his 10-year-old son.

Not only is this process a ton of fun, but it is actually important for his son’s socioemotional development as well. As kids grow they begin to see their parent’s flaws and limitations and that’s a good thing. At the same time that they are realizing their parents do not know and cannot do absolutely everything, they are learning and growing in what they themselves are capable of.

This can be an uncomfortable part of growth and opportunities where it feels genuinely fun are rare. Ken and his son have stumbled upon one such opportunity as Ken’s son often coaches Ken on what to do (or not do!) in chess. “Dad, you might want to rethink that move…”

Ken sees opportunity for ample connection through chess outside of his family, too. The pandemic has created barriers to many former methods of global engagement, as Ken reflects here, but chess acts as a unique unifier. Check out the full article to learn more!

Spotlight: Supporting Women in Chess with Ashley Priore

She played her first chess game at 4 and started her first non-profit at 14… does this sound like a child prodigy to you? Us too!

When Ashley Priore sees a problem, she jumps right in and does what she can to solve it. Her story with chess has a complexity many girls and women may face in the chess world. Chess helped Ashley develop the life skills she used to start a successful non-profit at such a young age, but it also introduced her to the need for that non-profit.

The vast majority of chess players in the United States are boys and men which can cyclically make it hard for girls and women to get involved. This week’s Chess4Life Spotlight covers Ashley’s personal experience as a girl in chess and explores common issues in chess gender equality today. We also get to hear about Ashley’s exciting efforts to empower girls in chess!

New Spotlight: Bryan Heathman, What Do Book Writing and Chess Have in Common?

If you were able to tune into Chess4Life’s Spotlight last week, you heard the story of how Kyle Haining’s chess mastery helped him in his coding career. Well, what about book writing? Can a game that is played mostly in silence have an impact on our ability to use the written word?

This week’s guest Bryan Heathman, author, publisher, and founder of Made for Success Publishing discusses the parallels between authorship and chess with Chess4Life founder Elliott Neff. Bryan was Elliott’s publisher and coach for his book, A Pawn’s Journey.

From the benefits of playing chess, and approaching career issues, “backwards” to the importance of remaining nimble, committed, and dedicated, Bryan highlights several of the ways chess and the publishing industry overlap. Check out the full article or full video!