After Memorial Day violence, children’s chess tournament offers necessary distraction

Hours after gunfire sent families fleeing at Seattle’s Pritchard Island Beach, a group of fifth graders sat face-to-face at the Van Asselt Elementary School Library.

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The 30 students were about a mile away from the Memorial Day mayhem. The shooting sent one of their peers, a ten-year-old girl, to the hospital. A 27-year-old mother and her ten-month-old son also got caught up in the gang crossfire.

Inside the library, a battle of the minds was about to begin.

“This is a good way to have the battle on the chess board. Not on the streets. Not somewhere else,” said Seattle Police Detective Denise “Cookie” Bouldin.

The 40-year-police veteran set up the Urban Youth Chess Tournament. It began with a moment of reflection.

“Some of you know some of the people that was hurt in that incident,” said Detective Cookie. “Let’s take a few seconds just to say a silent wish that we’re wishing that they get good.”

Most of the students at the tournament are considered at-risk youth. They attend either Van Asselt or nearby South Shore, both Title I schools. Many live in poverty, some sleep at homeless shelters, and nearly all grow-up in high-crime areas, including near Pritchard Island Beach.

“Some of these kids right here, they use that park,” said Detective Cookie. “They’re saying they’re afraid or had a dream that somebody shot them. These kids are living this and they are silently hurting.”

The pain is why Detective Cookie chose this area 13-years-ago for her Chess Club. She’s taught the game’s life lessons to thousands of kids, including Zekeriyia Kedir.

“Chess teaches you thinking before you do something,” said Kedir. “If you are violent, you could get in trouble or get arrested or go to jail.”

Kadir’s classmate, Anaya Austin, sees chess another way.

“It’s kind of like a career,” said Austin. “Like my next move is to go to middle school. It’s kind of like another move, but just slower. Very slow.”

Detective Cookie’s chess club has scientific merit. Some therapists and doctors use chess therapy to get positive results for people who have neurological disorders or learning disabilities. Van Asselt’s Principal Huyen Lam sees it first-hand.

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“Kids who often struggle with explosive emotion a lot — I can see some right there — this has helped them to stay really calm in certain situations and seeing themselves in a positive light,” said Lam.

Even the school’s success coach, Andre Mckinney-Asim, uses the game to resolve playground-politics.

“When there’s a conflict, students can sit across from each other and hash it out over a game of chess,” said Mckinney-Asim. “By the end of the game, they’re shaking hands and it definitely distracts them from what the conflict initially was.”

That was the goal Tuesday morning, after gun-violence hit so close to home; let these ten and eleven-year-olds just be kids for a couple hours and play a game in peace.

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