The Chess Advantage (Scholarships)

The Chess Advantage,

There are certain advantages to learning to play chess. Aside from the fact that chess is a great game, it also teaches players to think strategically. This ability to reason and think strategically has apparently found its admirers in academia. So much so that educational institutions are willing to pay and offer scholarships to students that are elite chess players.

There are a number of institutions that are willing to offer scholarships for chess champions. The rational is that those that have attained the status of elite in the world of chess also possess the qualities to make them successful students.

Texas Tech, the University of Maryland and Connecticut are some of the schools that offer scholarships for elite chess players. Some of the best scholarships cover tuition, room and board, and are worth over $69,400 over four years.

Also, let us not forget that the federal government is providing over $790 million in funding for the 2006-07 academic year and 4.5 billion over the next five years. The contacts for the Academic competitiveness and Smart Grants are Samara Yudor and Casey Ruberg (202) 401-1576
The Black American Teacher

Racism in America

This is my first post. Welcome to my world. What caught my attention today was a CNN report on racism in America. It was report on a small city in Texas called Vidor. Vidor is one of those cities in the south that is still stuck in its racist past. The reason I started this blog is because I think as Black Americans we need a constant reminder of how ugly things could get. More importantly, we also need to pay our respect to those who have sacrificed to give us the opportunities that we have available today.

Now back to the story. CNN visited a city named Vidor Texas to address its racist image. Vidor was one of those cities that that was known as a sundown city. The Ku Klux Klan openly marched and blacks were not allowed to be seen on the streets after sundown. Apparently, this was approximately 50 years ago. Well, you may say to yourself, 50 years ago there was alot of states that had some serious issues. This is true. However when a report on Vidor was going to aire on CNN in Vidor, CNN was blacked out to the residents of Vidor. It was pretty obvious that there was some in Vidor that did not want the people of Vidor to look in the mirror. When CNN decided to find out why was the issue of racism in America blacked out? It was explained away as technical difficulties. Ladies and gentleman, we must be ever vigilant and never forget the price we paid for this "freedom" that we enjoy today. We have a long way to go, but we cannot afford to give back the gains that we have made.

Talk to you soon,

The Teacher