April 18, 2011

In quest to be world leaders in Chess, Armenia make it compulsory in schools

by Gareth Mankoo

Did it ever occur to you how you can hone the skills of a generation, and build them into super champions of a new age that will rise you to domination? Armenia never really seemed to be the ones who’d come up with this concept but alas, it’s struck the nation now. Thankfully it’s not an unintelligible genre of music or some demented dictator that they’re grooming, it’s Chess. Plain as it may sound, the sport does hold a lot of scope for future Armenia as youngsters are now condemned to the rigorous routine of learning the game in school, compulsorily. What amazes me is that the country has invested a huge sum of money to add fuel to this initiative but are often subject to financial crisis.

The nation has committed a sum of $1.5 million to this effort. I know that it’s a long experiment but it may have some impressive results for the next generation to see. What’s more is this can also backfire, since students normally hate being forced to do anything. It’s an interesting case study nonetheless.
[Yahoo]