More than 500 players attended last month's state All-Grade championshiop at Whitney Young High School in Chicago, co-organized by Chess Education Partners, Whitney Young High School and the Youth Chess Fondation of Chicago.  This included 100 low-income students, many of whom were playing in their first tournament, who received free entry. 

The tournament had 13 sections, one each for grades kindergarten through 12.  A list of the winners follows.  Congratulations to all:

Kindergarten:  Nikolai Rhodes

1st grade:  William Zhu

2nd grade:  Jason Scott Daniels and David Wallach

3rd grade:  Vincent Do

4th grade:  Miranda Liu

5th grade:  Anshul Adve and Jack Curcio

6th grade:  Alec Feygin, Colton Longstreth and Akash Mattu

7th grade: John (Joey) Bikus and Allen Guo

8th grade:  Chase Walbert and Maximilian Zinski

9th grade:  Sam Schmakel

10th grade:  George Ruan and Charles Swan

11th grade: Jamison Kaczmarek

12th grade:  Saagar Gupta

Five of those champions---Rhodes, Adve, Zinski, Schmakel and Swan---are among close to 60 Illinois players who are spending this weekend in Orlando, Florida competing in the National All-Grade tournament, which runs from Friday to Sunday.  Players from three area high schools---Evanston, Glenbard South and Whitney Young---make up about half the Illinois contingent.   Click on this link to follow the results online.