10A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • WEDNESDAY, MARCH 25, 2015
Chess: In its second year, program is still gaining traction
Continued from Page 1A
For a few months, Rouse has
held club meetings during lunch
periods and after school on
Mondays and Fridays. He hopes
giving students different times
to meet will spark more interest
and increase participation.
The school administration
supports the program. Even if
only a handful of kids attend
the club, Principal John McAn-
drews said, “It’s important to
provide an opportunity they’re
engaged in.”
Gearhart’s second year
Dan King is leading Gear-
hart Elementary School’s chess
club into its second year, but the
program still is gaining traction.
King started a chess club at
Seaside Heights Elementary
School in 1980. The club lasted
about 20 years and took part in
the state chess tournament about
a dozen of those years. King
took a hiatus until about six
years ago, when a former chess
club member approached him at
Costco and told him the impact
the club had on him.
“At that point, I knew in my
heart, even though I was burned
out from going to state tour-
naments, I could still do chess
club, so I started up again,” he
said.
He left Seaside Heights about
a year and a half ago and went to
Gearhart, where he reignited the
chess club that had been there in
the 1980s. The club started its
second season in early Novem-
ber with Friday afternoon meet-
ings. In addition to about 15 stu-
dent participants, King has help
from several parent volunteers,
some of whom were on his team
at Seaside Heights. The club
is targeted toward fourth- and
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having younger students partici-
pate, as well.
Opportunity for
advancement
At Seaside High School,
senior Kris Booth tried to get a
chess program started this year
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was not able to garner the at-
tention and interest he needed,
said Booth’s mentor Eddie Park,
Sage Park’s grandfather.
“The inertia was just too
great for him to overcome,” he
said. “But, we will try again next
year.”
The goal is to spread the
word about chess in the commu-
nity, give students the opportu-
nity to play and, eventually, start
a competition team. Another as-
pect of the club will be interact-
ing with elementary and middle
school students.
The players
Sometimes people underes-
timate the ability of children to
grasp the technical nuances of
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younger students can start learn-
ing the game, King said.
He and David Rouse be-
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are numerous: improved prob-
pete in two qualifying events
and establish a Northwest Scho-
lastic Rating System or United
States Chess Federation rating.
Even though the state tourna-
ment is held in Seaside, Sage
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from Clatsop County to partici-
pate when she attends the tour-
nament this April.
Park also wants to make Sea-
side the site of qualifying tour-
naments in the future, which is
a possibility, according to Jeff
Dobbins, an Oregon Scholastic
Chess Federation board mem-
ber.
“The great thing about the
Oregon Scholastic Chess Feder-
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he said, adding a parent volun-
teer or teacher can put on a qual-
ifying tournament. “The goal of
the organization was to get more
people to set up tournaments
and run them on their own.”
The state tournament is open
for students ages 5 through 19,
or kindergartners through high
school seniors. It also offers
a separate section, called the
Friends and Family Section, for
KATHERINE LACAZE — EO Media Group
adults and other students who
Broadway Middle School chess club leader David Rouse, left, and sixth-grader Sage Park wait to make their chess KDYHQ¶W TXDOL¿HG 7KH VWXGHQWV
moves during a club meeting . The middle school is getting a new chess club program under instruction of Rouse, a in that section get to play four
student’s grandfather and the former Lady Seagulls soccer team coach.
games and get a sense of the
event, Dobbins said.
By participating in tour-
naments, he said, competitors
become “very aware of the con-
sequences of their actions” in a
controlled setting.
“You know, at the end of
the game, how well you do and
whether you win or lose is really
up to you and the choices you
made,” he said.
They also have the oppor-
tunity to meet and play against
people from all over the state
who share a common interest.
The federation’s state tour-
KATHERINE LACAZE — EO Media Group
nament is not a qualifying event
The Gearhart Elementary School chess club started its second
for a national competition, but
year a few weeks ago, under the guidance of Dan King. The
the winners of the high school
club, which is open to all students, has garnered the interest
and middle school divisions are
about 15 students and a few parent volunteers so far this year.
nominated to represent the state
at the national Denker Tourna-
ment of High School Cham-
pions and the Dewain Barber
Tournament of K–8 Champions
tournaments, respectively. The
top-rated girls also are nomi-
nated to play in national wom-
en-only events.
David Rouse said he is wait-
ing to see if attending tourna-
ments will be feasible for the
club. For now, he wants to focus
KATHERINE LACAZE — EO Media Group
on instruction and practice, and
Alicia Gagnon, second grade, considers her next move in he believes eventually the pro-
a chess game against fellow student Maddy Wrege during gram will attract students who
a chess club meeting at Gearhart Elementary School.
want to compete.
KATHERINE LACAZE — EO Media Group
Gearhart
Elementary
Fourth-grader Samuel Taylor makes a move in a chess as they used to be, he suggested.
Crystal Rouse said she’d be School’s program is strictly rec-
game during a chess club meeting at Gearhart Elemen-
“There were a lot more kids interested in competing, as well, reational at this point, King said,
tary School. The club was started last year and has about playing chess with their parents EXWVKH¿UVWZDQWVWRJHW³ZD\ and he prefers to keep it that
15 students this year.
in the 1980s and 1990s than more practice.” Luckily for her, way. He said he wants “students
there are today,” he said, adding her father and grandfather are to be proud that they know how
lem-solving skills, strategic clubs, either.
that, in his experience, “the kids available to give her that prac- to play chess, and to continue to
play chess through their adult
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If students had more oppor- who were really successful were tice.
lives.”
and creativity.
tunities to play during or after also playing at home.”
In the future
He has taught more than
Despite what the activity has school, King believes their inter-
For instance, Sage Park has
Eddie Park hopes the clubs’ 1,000 people to play chess in his
to offer, scholastic chess is not est in the game would increase been playing since she was 4
widely promoted in the school in turn. Instruction at home also years old under her grandfa- long-term goal is to help stu- life, and some of his proudest
GLVWULFWWKHUHLVQRWDFKHVVFOXE can affect the activity’s presence ther’s guidance. Now she is dents qualify for the Oregon moments are when those people
at Seaside Heights Elementary in the community.
one of only a few local students Scholastic Chess Federation tell him they still play the game.
“That’s what will melt my
School. The Knappa and Jewell
Students probably are not as seeking out competitions to at- State Tournament in April. To
DWWHQGVWXGHQWVPXVW¿UVWFRP- heart,” he said.
school districts don’t have chess exposed to chess in their homes tend.
Corps: Audubon Sociey of Portland announced it will
sue the Corps if the depredation permit is approved
Continued from Page 1A
Depending on the year, the
double-crested cormorants’
Daniel Roby, unit lead- diet could be as little as two
er-wildlife with the U.S. percent salmonids or as much
Geological Survey-Oregon as 20 percent.
Cooperative Fish and Wildlife
“The results of this
Research Unit at OSU, has Corps-funded study were ig-
been on and off the island for nored in setting or interpreting
decades. In a letter he submit- WKH VSHFL¿F PDQDJHPHQW RE-
ted during a public comment jective,” Roby continues. “...
period on the Corps’ plan, he instead one average per-cor-
said the Corps exaggerated morant smolt consumption
the risks of using non-lethal rate was assumed for setting
management techniques — management objectives.”
limiting nesting areas, hazing
The management plan calls
birds off the island, attracting for the killing of 5,380 to 5,939
them to other locations — and breeding pairs of double-crest-
downplayed the risk and un- ed cormorants that nest sea-
certainty of the lethal option.
sonally on East Sand Island
Supporters of the plan have at the mouth of the Columbia
pointed to the need to protect River over the next four years,
salmon runs, and certainly a move that could result in the
the cormorants as well as the potential loss of 72.5 percent
Caspian terns that nest on the RI WKH QHVWV LQ WKH ¿UVW WKUHH
LVODQGHDWWKHLU¿OORIVDOPRQ years, according to the Corps.
upwards of 20 million juvenile
In addition to shooting birds
salmonids each year between with shotguns, contractors
the bird species, according to would also prevent a number of
the Corps. But those numbers eggs from hatching through a
can vary greatly from year to process called egg oiling.
year, Roby wrote.
OSU researchers will no
“...the Corps funded our longer be on the island. Mon-
research team to investigate itoring will be done by other
the factors that are respon- contractors — likely people
sible for the large inter-an- with federal Wildlife Services
nual variation in cormorant — if a the lethal take is ap-
predation rates on salmonid proved. The Corps estimates
smolts,” he said.
it will cost the agency approx-
imately $685,000 to $905,000
to monitor the colony during
the nesting season.
It could take about 30 days
to get a depredation permit
approved for this year and
there is still a chance it won’t
be approved. But if the Corps
does land the permit, lawsuits
are also on the horizon.
The Audubon Society of
Portland announced it will
sue the Corps if the permit is
approved.
“We are deeply disap-
pointed that despite more
than 145,000 comments op-
posing this decision, the fed-
eral government has chosen
to move forward with the
wanton slaughter of thou-
sands of protected birds,”
said Audubon Society of
Portland conservation di-
rector Bob Sallinger in a
statement. “Rather than ad-
dressing the primary cause
of salmon decline, the man-
ner in which the Corps op-
erates the Columbia River
Hydropower System, the
Corps has instead decided
to scapegoat wild birds and
pursue a slaughter of historic
proportions. Sadly this will
do little or nothing to protect
wild salmon but it will put
Double-crested Cormorant
populations in real jeopardy.”
“It’s a complex issue,”
said Corps spokesperson Di-
ana Fredlund.
There are salmon, cor-
morants, tribes, commercial
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men, the hydropower system:
³:H¶UHWU\LQJWR¿QGZLWKWKH
help of our partner agencies,
the best ways of making that
balance,” Fredlund said.