Freehold Twp. students

Freehold Twp. students

rise to chess challenges

BY LINDA DeNICOLA

Staff Writer

FREEHOLD TOWNSHIP — Some people may consider chess a sport and others may consider it a game, but children in the township’s K-8 school district think of it as just plain fun.

Chess seems to be a popular after-school club in the district’s schools. Most of the K-8 schools have a team and those that do not are planning to start chess clubs soon.

Several of the teams recently won trophies in chess tournaments. Last fall, the chess club at the C. Richard Applegate School won first place at a chess tournament held at Brookdale Community College, Lincroft. The chess club from the Laura Donovan School took a third-place trophy.

On Feb. 29, again at Brookdale, the Joseph J. Catena School chess team walked away with two trophies for the school and one for an individual. According to Lisa Gilboy, who is the chess club liaison and the mother of one of the team members, the children in K-3 came in second in the state and the older stu­dents, fourth- and fifth-graders, came in fifth in their age group.

In addition, second-grader Kevin Hayne placed fifth in the primary section, Gilboy said, noting that Kevin won four out of his five games and received a tro­phy.

"We were very proud of the children. For them to go to a state tournament and walk away with two trophies for the school was quite an accomplishment," she said.

Hal Sprechman is the team’s coach. He said the tournament in February is the New Jersey Elementary Championship and the one that was held on Nov. 16 was the New Jersey Grade School Championship. During the grade school tournament the children compete in just their grade.

He said there are 30 to 35 children who attend the Wednesday night chess club on a regular basis. They play for 75 minutes, said Sprechman, who has been coaching for 11 years.

Sprechman said he is an average tour­nament player but his son, who attends the University of Maryland-Baltimore County, is on the chess team there. In fact, it was through his son that he be­came a chess coach at the school.

"My son asked me to start up a chess club," Sprechman said. "I think the bene­fits of chess are tremendous. It teaches critical thinking skills and helps children develop greater self-confidence. It’s chal­lenging and takes a lot of concentration. Besides, it’s a lot of fun.

"I substitute [teach] in high school and I’ve also substituted in middle schools in Freehold Township. When I was substi­tuting in an accelerated math class I knew many of the students because they were in the chess club," Sprechman ex­plained.

Most of the chess teams are headed by PTO parents from the individual schools.

Ed Mica is the parent coordinator for the Applegate School. That club meets on Wednesday nights at the school and is taught by Joe Manuli.

The Applegate club, which is made up of first- through fifth-graders, has about 52 children registered and about 35 who come every week,

Mica has three chess players in his family, Ian, Sean and Kerry. He said Applegate’s winning team was made up of three players — Noah Marinelli, Casey Lau and John Amoroso.

According to John Marinelli, father of Noah, all three students live on the same street, Rustic Lane, but they don’t play chess with each other outside of the class. They do play with their families, he said.

Mica said the club is fun.

"They get some critical thinking, but for the most part it is just fun and they are not home playing Nintendo by them­selves like so many children do these days. They are socializing with other kids. In addition, it teaches them how to lose. Sometimes you win, and more often you lose."

Nikki Church, the coach at the Laura Donovan School, has been working with students at that school for two years. She lives in Highlands and met Sprechman at a chess tournament. He told her the Donovan School needed a coach and asked her if she wanted the job.

Church said yes and has loved every minute of it, she said, especially the kindergartners, who she placed in a sepa­rate club that meets on Thursday evening before the older children. She has about 60 students, including 15 kindergartners.

Her club members also took part in the Brookdale tournaments. During the first one, the fourth grade came in third and Michael Codispoti won an individual tro­phy, as did Sragvi Tirumaoa, who won third place for his third grade.

"We didn’t do so well at the tourna­ment in February," Church said, adding, "We had 14 kids go. That’s a large amount of children coming into the tour­nament. Two of them were girls and a lot of parents were there. We can take a loss because it was a very good learning expe­rience for them. Losing is when you learn the most. It’s the way that you grow."

She said the benefits of learning and playing chess are numerous.

"It’s an intellectual game that helps with logic, visual memory, patience and self-esteem," she said.

Church said the Marshall W. Errickson School will have a chess club starting at the end of April. She will be the coach and since the Donovan club ended on March 25, she will be coaching the Errickson club on the same night, Thursday.

In addition, she will be running a chess camp this summer at the Kateri center in Marlboro.

Charles David Thayer has been the chess coach at the Eisenhower Middle School for five years. This year the club, which meets on Wednesday nights, has six or seven students. One of them, Kim Fuller, finished with four wins and one loss at a competition at Rutgers University, he said, adding that Kim came home with a seventh-place trophy in the K-9 division.

The Barkalow Middle School also has a chess group. It is headed by Lisa Marotta, a sixth grade language arts teacher.

Right now the only school that does not have a chess club is the West Freehold School, but once the new West Freehold School opens in the fall a chess club will be formed, Church said.