Oxfordian Life

Wins Chess Tournament

Wins Chess Tournament

José Emilio Rodríguez Pineda took first place at the weekend in the Achieve Early College tournament, where he faced rivals from different categories from across the Rio Grande Valley.

Our student, who is in sixth grade at Las Quintas Campus, took part successfully in the event organised by Dark Knight Chess on Saturday 12 February at Achieve High School in McAllen, Texas, where he beat Middle School and High School opponents, winning all 5 rounds he played and so taking first place among the 35 competitors who took part.

The tournament, held under the Swiss system in the open category, is not José Emilio’s first — he even holds membership of the United States Chess Federation (USCF), having played chess since the age of 7 and taken part in tournaments in the discipline since 2015, gaining great satisfaction such as his most recent victory over older competitors in a field of 36 secondary and high school students.

His love of chess arose from his first encounter with it in the co-curricular classes within Oxford’s programme of study, as his father, José Rodríguez, explains: “From the first year of primary, José Emilio showed an interest in learning this sport and in taking part competitively in chess tournaments. One factor that sparked his interest was the very tournaments Oxford organised at Las Quintas Campus and the start of his classes within his programme of study; from then on he learned the fundamentals of chess in classes with the teacher Rodolfo Noble of Las Quintas Campus, and later deepened his learning with his current teacher, Luis Ávila, who also teaches at Vista Hermosa Campus.”

Chess is a discipline included in our programme of study as a co-curricular class because of its many benefits for our students’ all-round development, which are reflected principally in emotional intelligence, mathematical ability and reading comprehension.

Also considered a sport, chess plays a fundamental role in children’s capacity for problem solving, decision making and attention span; it supports social relationships and helps structure thinking, among many other aspects essential to daily life.

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