There was an announcement made today that spectators at National Scholastics would be barred from the tournament room during the rounds. This thread might end up being moved to the issues forum but starting out in the tournaments forum seems feasible.
The following are just a few of the spectator interventions that have been made over the years at various large scholastic tournaments (including some nationals).
There was a touch move violation. (from a person standing at floor level looking at a board 50 feet away with a direct line of site passing over 10-20 boards on the way (depending on whether or not the direct line would cut across adjacent boards)
A parent was giving a kid a signal. (in the days before chess computers with a 300-strength parent and an 800-strength kid, from a balcony 60 feet away with no binoculars, and the kid lost - so the complainant said that the kid was signaled to lose to throw off suspicion)
A parent was giving a kid a signal. (from a spectator area 30 feet away when the parent scratched an itch)
I was not giving my kid a signal. (for waving to the kid and getting the kid’s attention while pantomiming an action the parent wants the kid to take after the game - such as calling or going to the team room)
An opponent is messing with the mind of my kid. (for spending time thinking about the next move)
An opponent is messing with the mind of my kid. (for playing a move quickly without giving my kid time to write the previous move down and think about it)
There was an illegal move. (the player castled queen-side and put the king on the c-file instead of the b-file - well the parent THOUGHT it was an illegal move) The opponent isn’t keeping notation.
My kid isn’t keeping notation.
My kid forgot to press the clock.
That parent has a phone that probably has a chess app on it and it could have been taken out to analyze so that a signal could be made to the kid.
That parent has been watching the game and is waiting for the kid to go to the nearest restroom so that a helpful comment can be made.
Those parents are noisy and that is disturbing my kid.
In the very long ago olden days I was the floor chief of a national tournament that banned spectators during the round. At one point, after the spectators left the playing hall so we could start the round, I asked the kids if they preferred, via a show of hands, that the parents/coaches be allowed in or removed from the playing area. Overwhelmingly the youngsters choose removing the spectators.
Myron Thomas closed the floor in the middle of the tournament in Columbus this year. That venue has a second floor balcony overlooking the playing hall that has been notorious for noise and bad behavior. The decision was made to continue that practice in Nashville for the elementary. It worked well once we got the kids into the proper routine to find their parents.
We will still have a lot of education to do for the next cycle of events. We had a lot of parents attempt to enter the hall after the round had started. The closed floor will also necessitate that we secure players bathrooms at all of the venues we use.
And this is why it’s so much better to have a closed-floor policy that everyone knows in advance.
I’ve been at a couple of scholastic nationals where the floor closed or spectators were further restricted right at the beginning of the event (without pre-tournament publicity) or during the event itself. The organizers and TD leadership kept trying to make spectating work. When it didn’t work and the rules changed without advance notice, we saw a lot of parental anxiety and disgruntlement. This has got to be better.
The following clarifications are posted with the prior knowledge of the Executive Director.
The floor was closed by Mr. Thomas, at my direction.
This can be mitigated by education, not eliminated. Staff vigilance will be critical to enforce a closed floor.
Securing a bathroom means restricting access. The Scholastic Regulations do not mandate this, for a reason. Restricting bathroom access is always dependent upon the site, and is not possible at some sites.
Any site with player-only bathrooms must have sufficient public bathroom space nearby that taking away one set of bathrooms won’t place an undue burden on our non-participant attendees, or other groups who are in house at the time.
Thank you for the clarifications Boyd, I was likely not as clear for those who were not present at those events.
One concern I have about the bathrooms is that with a closed floor, bathrooms will be perceived as the “most likely” place for cheating to occur. We do not want adults to accost children in the bathrooms or taking pictorial “evidence” over the stall doors. My fear is this type of behavior might intensify.
In 2016 the National JH used two rooms with the non-championship sections having no room at all for spectators while the championship section had a center aisle. The noise involved during the first round meant that the center aisle could only be used in subsequent rounds for the first ten minutes of the round and the floor was closed thereafter. Also in 2016 the National Elementary started with a center aisle and a spectator area. After the first(?) round the length of the center aisle access was shortened. After the third(?) round the center aisle access was entirely eliminated. After the fifth(?) round the spectator seating area access was eliminated from use during the first half hour of play each round.
This is a good move by US Chess and/or the Scholastic Council. We did our best to provide spectators with the ability to watch games but there is always a minority that spoil it for everyone and so getting this out there early will make sure it doesn’t come as a shock to folks attending the tournaments.
Now steps have been taken to reduce issues with spectators how about getting rid of all the cellphones?
Cellphones already cannot be out at these events. As much as keeping them out of the room entirely makes all kinds of sense from a tournament administration standpoint, from a customer service standpoint we have a different problem.
With parents not allowed in the room, a larger percentage will want little Johnny to have a phone with him so they can make calls after the game is over and find mom/dad/coach who must be elsewhere. So there is a balancing act here.
Setting up a place to deposit phones to be claimed later could be a possibility, but that would also be a potential nightmare logistically and for liability reasons.
What is done at the All Girls National event seems like a very workable solution to the question/problem of cell phones. At the boards there are little buckets that players are to deposit their cell phones during the game. The phones are to be turned off, and not taken with them until the end of the game. The only problem is the need to sometimes remind the player(s) to take the phone with them after the game is over. I think this is easier than a coat check like system where the players are given a ticket when they check their phone outside of the playing room. I saw this coat check system used at the Open Portugal tournament in February in Lisbon and it did seem to work OK.
I do wonder about player photographs for closed floor events. It is quite common for parents to want to take photos of their kids at these events. Will the USCF be providing photos of the children to the parents? I would be surprised if this is not brought up by at least some parents.
This idea was considered and rejected. The larger the event, the more troublesome such a method becomes. I do not want to be responsible for phones left behind by players. It also seems illogical to encourage cell phones in the playing hall. It’s better for players to simply not bring them in, or to have them powered off in their bags, not on their person.
At this time, there are no plans to offer portrait photography during national events. Parents who want shots of their children at their boards should arrive in sufficient time before the scheduled start of the round to take such pictures.
To clarify a few points - it has been about a decade now since I was at TD at nationals. But I do remember parents having a roped off area some distance from the actual playing area, but in the same hall. Are these areas now extinct? Secondly, are cell phones, even
on silent mode, forbidden from these areas, if they exist - and what about other electronics, such as tablets, lap tops, etc ?
At this time, there are no plans to offer portrait photography during national events. Parents who want shots of their children at their boards should arrive in sufficient time before the scheduled start of the round to take such pictures.
Boyd M. Reed | MSA Listing
++++++++++++++++++++++
What is the rationale behind this decision? I thought that photography was a profit center for US Chess at these events ? Is this
not correct? What issues from this type of publicity would make this problematic?
Given the new spectator policy for national scholastics, i.e., “no spectators,” the roped-off areas are extinct. One of the things that made them extinct was … parental cell phones going off in the spectator area during play.
Here is another parent trick I was told of but could not definitively verify. A parent in a balcony area was using a laser pointer when his son’s opponent was away from the board to point to the square where a piece should go.
My preference is to have a completely closed area, with no parents, coaches, Scholastic Council members, or USCF officials outside of the staff TDs. These extra people are distracting to the kids. Their presence also leads to complaints that they are helping their own kids or members of a team. After the first round, the kids should not be led to their boards by a parental entourage for pictures, kisses, and hugs. It takes a long time to move this herd out of the playing area. The kids know how to find their boards and set their clocks. They do not need parents to do that for them every round. If they don’t know how to do this, then they should not be in a tournament.
And parents using laptops, Ipads etc in those areas with other parents complaining about it - even when they were not on chess sites. I’ve been a section chief with a section near that area and ended up spending most of my time dealing with spectator issues. I’ve also dealt with a p[aren’t complaining about their kid’s opponent "bothering " their kid, when the game was at the far other end of the playing hall and you really could not see it. But dad was convinced his kid was “bothered” - even those the player made no complaint. I’ve had parents/coaches complain about how long it took to answer their kid’s hand when it went up - even though the entire TD staff was dealing with other issues at the time.
Also the spectator area is a problem for noise issues from spectators talking, especially after the first couple of a bunch of kids gets done and hangs out in that area as well.
I’m happy to see that continue. Most parents walk their kid to the board, make friendly conversation with the other parents, then leave the room when it’s time.
(Still, I’m willing to stand directly in front of the cell phone camera of that one parent who wants to be the last one out of the playing hall, in order to get that picture of the playing hall without parents in it. I’m in a lot of outtakes.)
There is always that parent who is"special" and who is certain they aren’t doing anything wrong when everyone else is walking towards the rear of the room and they’re walking forward.
While we’re at it, can we also lock all of the doors immediately when the round begins and set the default time to zero? That would also make things run much more smoothly, though the default time would likely raise a lot of complaints.
The opponent isn’t keeping notation.