European Chess Union and ECU EDU Commission supported by the FIDE Development fund organised on 9th of November in Stockholm, Sweden the Nordic QueenS Seminar.
The main theme of the Seminar was equality between genders in chess. During the seminar, Chairman of ECU Educational Commission, Jesper Hall, and member of ECU Women’s Commission, Alice O’Gorman, presented the results of the recent Survey on Women’s Chess throughout Europe.
The participants also discussed about situation in Women’s chess in Nordic countries and defined the issues and possible solutions on how to increase the percentage of women playing chess. The idea was to have a workshop on how girls and women chess can be improved, share experiences and reflections and in the next step how to co-operate.
The participants of the Seminar were:
Jesper Hall, Fredrik Lindgren, Johanna Björg Jóhannsdóttir, Björn Karlsson, Christina Sima, Arild Rimestad, Sara Marie Skaug Björkly, Marte Kyrkjebö, Geir Nesheim, Heini Puuska, Asko Hentunen and Alice O’Gorman.
After reviews of what kind of problems are faced in a journey of promoting and developing Women’s chess, the participants came to 3 ideas which shall be realized by Nordic federations as soon as possible:
In each board of the Nordic federations there should be one especially appointed person towards girls and women chess.
This person shall have a workable network with the players, trainers, mothers in the country.
A Code of conduct
The Nordic federations should present a Code of Conduct on how to behave. This Code should be used in the national federations as well and be spread down to districts, clubs and members. The federations should also have a plan for how to act when the code is broken on different levels.
A co-operation between the Nordic countries on girls and women traveling to tournaments. Inspiration to this is Jentebrigaden, and the idea is that if 40 girls and women come to tournament, they will not fell alone, and the tournament might even reach the 30% rule. With a cooperation between the Nordic countries, this number of players will be possible to reach.
Also, the participants of the seminar discussed which steps shall be coped to attract the sponsors of chess events and girls and women’s in chess programs.
Presentation made by ECU EDU Commission regarding analyses of Survey on Women’s Chess
ECU Nordic Queen Seminar- Norway presentation
ECU Nordic Queen Seminar presentation
ECU Nordic Queen Seminar notes
ECU Nordic Queen Seminar Notes 2
