training courses for coaches?

[lukebarker]

Training courses for coaches?

The English CSC
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://chessinschools.co.uk/training_courses.htm">http://chessinschools.co.uk/training_courses.htm</a><!-- m --> noticed this via twitter.

is there an equivalent here in Scotland at all, or has it been discussed at any point? (sorry if this is a many-posted question etc!)

Luke

[Linda McCusker]

These courses lokk really good. If there was an equivalent in Scotland I would be interested in attending to help me out with coaching the beginners in my school chess club.

[Jacqui Thomas]

From their site I found the following. So only for England & Wales but surely worth someone contacting them to see if it would be possible north of the border (even at a cost as this is set up as a charity) or why in fact it only covers England & Wales.

The chestnut up here is someone finding the time & resources to run it. I know SJC looked into running a one day course but it's very difficult to find a mutual date where everyone can attend as in service days tend to get used up with other vital things & let's face it there will be very few teaching staff willing to give up a day over the weekend.

From CSC
Participating schools benefit from:

Weekly visits from a CSC chess tutor.
Chess equipment, books, teaching aids and software.
A curriculum with lesson plans, worksheets and handouts.
Training for teachers and teaching assistants.
Entry to a national schools' competition.
Free activities day at the London Chess Classic.

The charity funds the major cost of the programme for qualifying primary schools in England and Wales. If you are interested in working with CSC please contact us on 020 7935 3445 or email <!-- e --><a href="mailto:info@chessinschools.co.uk">info@chessinschools.co.uk</a><!-- e -->.

[Alex McFarlane]

Jacqui,
The CSC is only registered as a charity in England and Wales.

Andy H and I both spoke to Malcolm Pein some time ago about any intentions he had to move into Scotland. At that point he was unwilling to go through the process of setting up a similar charity in Scotland. I have been told within the last week that that situation may be changing.

I don't think if anyone wanted to attend one of the current courses it would be a problem.

I don't think In-Service training of this type has been done in Scotland, certainly not on a regular basis, for over 20 years.

Gerald Bonner used to do them regularly at Jordanhill and David Wallace did a series around Scotland after that. I was involved in one or two of these.
Bob Wade did one in Edinburgh organised by the SJCA.

Most recently was the training given to teachers in North Ayrshire. I offered to do a similar thing in Glasgow but the offer was declined.

[lukebarker]

Thanks for all your replies, very interesting, hope CSC style training (and other stuff!) is coming here.

We could perhaps do a crowd-source funding effort (using one of these websites etc) as a testbed / experiment. If a few people can get trained up with help from community funding like that it could be a good way of showing the enthusiasm that I personally think is out there.

[Linda McCusker]

Most recently was the training given to teachers in North Ayrshire. I offered to do a similar thing in Glasgow but the offer was declined.

That is disappointing Alex. Did the Council give a reason for turning down your offer? I know a number of teachers who would like training in running a school chess club. Let's face it running a chess club is very straight forwards compared to running other school clubs such as the Science Club for example. I speak from experience