Each year Chess in the Schools organizes several “chess challenges” between employees of companies that support CIS with students from our College Bound program. In a normal year, these events would be held at the offices of a partner company and students from the CIS program would travel to the office after school and have a tour of the offices, eat some snacks, and play a competitive yet friendly tournament with adults who like chess!

We have done several of these events with Credit Suisse where we have paired students with employees for “team chess.” These events have been fun for all participants and have given students a chance to meet professionals and make meaningful connections.  Well, this year has been far from normal, and doing a live event was not possible due to COVID-19.  This summer, we created a new, remote version that was a huge success!

On Thursday, July 30, 2020, our College Bound students met online via Zoom with employees from Credit Suisse. After some quick introductions, CIS students and employees were assigned teams with 50% CIS students and 50% Credit Suisse employees. Instructions for our special LICHESS Team Battle were announced and then teams were sent to “Team Breakout Rooms” during the event for coaching and banter! At the end of the event, all participants were brought back to announce the winners.

In the planning stages, doing the event online felt like a big negative. However, once the event started, it was clear that running an event like this online is more than possible and can even have the added benefit of getting together players from out-of-state offices and students with long commutes who otherwise would be unable to attend.

Chess in the Schools would like to thank Credit Suisse for their continued support and for working with us to create this special online corporate chess challenge. If you would like us to plan an employee event for your company, please contact Shaun Smith at ssmith@chessintheschools.org.