By Marcus Uhe
The Pakenham Secondary College girl’s chess team are the current Queens of the school yard following their success at last month’s Northern Star Chess Secondary Girls State Finals, held at Penleigh and Essendon Grammar in the city’s North.
The team finished second from a field of 15 competing schools, only behind the hosts, to claim the runners-up trophy for 2023.
Year eight student Chloe Dryden was the best performed student from Pakenham Secondary College, placing 10th on the individual rankings out of 37 participants and tied for the third-best year eight student.
Where much of the competitors were in their senior years of high school, Pakenham offered a much younger cohort, with the oldest students currently in year nine.
The College’s chess coach, Sergio De Lima, said the young students’ performances against older and more experienced competitors will hold them in good stead for future competitions, and continue the legacy of strong chess lineage at the school.
“Our players, we did lose one player that’s moving to New South Wales, but if the rest of the team keeps playing then absolutely we can win next year, I think so,” De Lima said.
“We try and play at every recess and lunch.
“Sometimes I have yard duty and we have our library staff looking after the club if we are not here, so there’s a lot of cooperation and people involved in making the club continue.
“It’s been 13 years now that we’re running the club so it’s been a long time.
“It’s a strong culture, I think it’s the longest living club at the school that I know of that’s still going.
“We’ve proven that in the right circumstances, our students can succeed and compete against the best schools in the country and state.“
In addition to the success of the girl’s team, 17 students qualified for the State chess competition and the school finished eighth overall at the Chess Secondary Open State Finals out of 47 schools and 298 competitors.
De Lima said the dedication and commitment to the craft from the team has seen their ability skyrocket, from relative rookies to tactically-sound.
So much so that the players now have De Lima and his fellow teacher’s measure on the chess board.
“We are constantly playing tournaments and challenging the students so they make the chess better,” he said.
“When they come to us at the beginning, they’re very green, they don’t know a lot of strategies.
“They might know how to move the pieces but after a few turns of competing against some of the best players, it’s incredible that, by year 10, most students can beat all the teachers.
“It’s humbling but it makes us very proud to see them develop those skills.
“We had students in the past who were diagnosed with some learning disabilities, but in chess they showed that they can learn because they get really good at it.
“If they have some levels of autism they find it a good place to come and play chess and develop their skills really well.“
Pakenham Secondary College girl’s chess team: Marinella Salvador, Malia Nimaya, Chloe Dryden, Alexandra Fitzgerald, Gowri Prabhu and Yekta Abdullahi.
