Fall Meetings

Wednesday meetings, 7 pm, 1216 H.J. Patterson Hall

No meeting on November 23 (due to Thanksgiving)

Friday meetings, 4 pm, Stamp Student Union

outside of the food court, above the co-op.

Regular members range from 12 kyu to 3 dan, but players of all strength are welcome.

Our first meeting (Aug. 31) had 12 people, which is likely to be typical.

Summer meetings

The club will continue Wednesday meetings through June, and there will be a break in July.

Dates of Wednesday meetings, summer 2011 (7 pm, 1216 H.J. Patterson Hall):
May 18, 25; June 8, 15, 22, 29
No meetings: July 6, 13.

Dates of Wednesday meetings, summer 2011 (6 pm, 1216 H.J. Patterson Hall):
August 17, 24
Regular meetings resume with the semester on Aug. 31 (so 7 pm)

2011 John Groesch Memorial

The 2011 John Groesch Memorial was held on Sunday, March 20.
This year, only six players participated in the three-round tournament. Takemasa Miyoshi (9 kyu) was the undefeated winner, 3-0, of the single section, fully handicapped, three round tournament. Takemasa is currently a Research Assistant Professor in the department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Science at the University of Maryland. The final game vs. Nate Eagle (10 kyu) was a nail-biter, which Takemasa won by a half-point. Other two game winners were Gurujeet Khalsa (9 kyu) and Zarathustra Goetzel (10 kyu). By the way, Takemasa's family in Japan is all OK (living in Osaka).

This year, the John Groesch Memorial prize for the best performance by a player under the age of 20 who is new to tournament go (defined by less than two years of tournament play) was not awarded because we had no eligible players. However, John's mother provided ample refreshments, some of which we will be sharing at club meetings for weeks to come (but no meeting this week, because it's spring break at the University of Maryland).

2011 John Groesch Memorial, March 20, 2011

The 2011 John Groesch Memorial tournament will be held on March 20, 2011. Registration and check-in opens at 9:00. Please come before 9:30 if you want to play. The time limit will be 60 minutes per player (plus 15 moves per 5 minutes in Canadian overtime). The entry fee of $20 will be waived for UM College Park students.

The John Groesch Memorial Prize will be given to the player under 20 who is new to tournament go (defined by less than two years of tournament play). The prize is named in honor of John Groesch, who played at out club in 2001 and 2002. This year, the prize will again be $50. Additional prizes will be based on entries.

UM Go Club on Foursquare and Twitter

Inspired by the idea that people might want to let others know when they are at the go club I registered us with both Foursquare and Twitter.

Foursquare is a location-based service for smartphones. Users "check in" with an app or on the web. Doing this gives you points and badges. Only one person can be the "mayor" of a venue. I just created my own account and I have never checked in anywhere, so I'm not the best person to explain it, but Wikipedia seems to do a decent job. Our foursquare venue id is 14485005. Let's see who becomes mayor!

Twitter is probably familiar to you. Our ID is UMGoClub (so, twitter.com/umgoclub); I've also put the feed on our sidebar (to the left here). Twitter will be useful for making real-time announcements about the club.

Club news by email

If you have not already, join the club list on Google groups (here). Announcements will come by email and appear online here. I will ask people who plan to come each week to reply to my weekly email (I've changed the settings so they can do this more easily). The meeting on Jan. 12 is canceled. Watch this space for news about next week.

Should we use a check in system?

Go club members,
Someone suggested that we use a "check in" system such as FourSquare or Gowalla to announce when we are at the go club. Perhaps we could also make it easy to indicate an intention to come (and to check whether others plan to come). If you have have an idea about how we can do this most effectively, please comment here.
Thanks!

Go at Deerfield Run Elementary

Former UM student Seth Tucker writes about his activities at Deerfield Run ES:

Thank you so much for all of your assistance last year. It was such a success that we went from having 15 students come regularly last year to over 60 sign up this year (23 turned in their permission slips the next school day after getting it before lunch). Unfortunately, we only have enough equipment for 32 students to play at the same time. We have only made room for 36 students and 4 student tutors who had taken part in last years program. While we are in the process of trying to find other staff members so we can expand, I have students come up to me everyday asking if there is room yet. Some have even tried sneaking into the club after school. I know that if we could expand the club then more students would sign up. On the first day that the students could turn in their permission slips we had to announce a waiting list.

We have had 2 sessions so far both going beyond my expectations. The kids are all excited and having so much fun. I can't wait until Tuesday so we can continue that fun.

I know that the program has had a great benefit on our students socially (one of my students diagnosed with autism actively went up to other students to ask if they would like to play, which was a major step for him). I also saw improved work habits from my students who took part in the club. One student who went from turning in almost no work to getting a C in math (another big step for said student). And all of the 6th graders who graduated did so with some award for either good conduct or honor roll. While all of that is great, I would like to have some hard data to show. It is my plan for the next week or so to check to see if there was any major improvement for our students state testing scores.

I also have been playing with the idea of expanding the club out to other schools in the area. Obviously this has become extremely popular here, I will have to attempt to contact other schools in the area to gauge their feelings on it. Hopefully having some hard data in hand will help with that. I am also looking to find ways to bring in members of the community to help, though we are running up against the difficulty of getting people fingerprinted so they can work with our students.

As for now though we need more equipment. What we have from last year held up from hard use, but I would like to not have to have students play on the cheap cardboard boards (that is unless we have so many kids that that is our only choice). ... We had a lot of success last year, we continue to grow, and we continue to learn how to make this program better. We appreciate any assistance you can provide in growing our club and in enriching our students lives and education.

--
Seth Tucker
5th Grade MEANS Teacher
Deerfield Run ES
(301)497-3610

Deerfield Run ES is only 15 minutes away from the school and they're looking for members of the community to help out.

2010 Back To School Go Tournament

Hello,

This year we decided to do things differently by hosting a new Back To School Go Tournament on September 4, 2010. We had twelve (12) participants from the local area come by to play including two new members to the University of Maryland Go Club. The grand winner was the 3-Dan Justin Teng. University of Maryland Student Wayne Zhang won the lower kyu section with three undefeated wins. Kevin Chin was the upper kyu section winner from Great Falls, VA.

We would like to thank everyone who came to participate and help out. Thanks!

2010 John Groesch tournament and elections

The 2010 John Groesch Memorial was held on Saturday, Feb. 20.
12 players participated in the four-round tournament. Joe Shin was
the undefeated winner (4-0). Remarkably, this was his first
tournament! Zarathustra Goertzel also finished 4-0 and won the kyu
prize.

In this tournament, the real prize is the John Groesch Memorial prize
for the best performance by a player under the age of 20 who is new to
tournament go (defined by less than two years of tournament play),
which was won this year by Alexei Avakov (3 points).

Elections were held April 7, and the following officers were elected for the 2010-2011 academic year:

President: Andrew Thacker
Vice President: Kevin Chuang
Secretary: Jamie Salts
Treasurer: Andrew Chang

UMD Go Club Officers, 2009-2010

UM Go Club officers were elected on April 29 for the 2009-2010 academic year.
Next year's leadership will be:

President		Jamie Salts
Vice President		Matt Zamora
Secretary		Steve Guth
Treasurer		Andrew Chang

2009 John Groesch Memorial

The 2009 John Groesch Memorial was held on April 11. 20 players participated. Eric Lui was the winner (again), with three points. He was defeated in the last round by Todd Blatt (with 8 stones handicap). Second prize went given to Todd Blatt on tiebreaks; Andrew Hubbard, Ryan Goldenberg and Justin Teng had the same 2 point score. The first kyu section (2 kyu and below) was won by UM Go club President Jamie Salts (3 points), who was undefeated (he had one bye). The second kyu section (20 kyu and below) was won by Jessica Huang (w ith 2 points). The third kyu section (25 kyu and below) was won by Sean Huang on tiebreaks over Leo Huang (both with three points).

Leo Huang (left) vs. Sean Huang (right)

The John Groesch Memorial prize for the best performance by a player under the age of 20 who is new to tournament go (defined by less than two years of tournament play) was won by Jessie Chen (18 kyu) with 3 points.

2009 John Groesch Memorial prize winner Jessie Chen (left), considers her move against David Reed as Barbara Huang (right) looks on.

Todd Blatt looks happy with the second place prize of hand-made ceramic go bowls.

A theme of youth go permeated this tournament. Consider the following:
1) 10 players (half of the field) came together from New York. They are cousins on their spring break, all 14 years old or younger: Jessie Chen, Barbara Huang, Daren Huang, Diana Huang, Jessica Huang, Joanne Huang, Leo Huang Sean Huang, Sophia Huang and Shirley Liu. Unfortunately, they played most of their games against each other.
2) Local high school student Gikuyu ("Kenny") Nderitu entered his AGA tournament as a one dan! He has been coming the University of Maryland Go club and is a fixture in our room on KGS.
3) UM club president Jamie Salts, the 2008 John Groesch prize winner, went undefeated.
4) Only three of the 20 players in this tournament were older than 25.
5) 7 of the top 8 players (2 kyu through 8 dan) are affiliated with either the UM College Park Go Club or the UM Baltimore County Go Club.

Our big event of the semester is:

*The John Groesch Memorial tournament*
http://chapters.usgo.org/umd/Spring.html

*When*: Saturday, April 11th

*Where*: The Benjamin Banneker Room at the Stamp Student Union

*Cost*: $20 for adults. $10 for youth under 12. This tournament requires AGA
membership. You can apply for AGA membership using the link below:

http://www.usgo.org/org/application.html

AGA membership costs $30 a year for adults and $10 a year for youth 22 and
under. We are an official AGA chapter, so we can offer a $15 per year
membership for the first two years if you sign up through our club. This is
only for players who have never had an AGA membership before. If you want
this discounted rate, please fill out the promotional application form
attached and bring it to a club meeting (as soon as possible so we have
time to mail your application in).

*Prizes*: There'll be a $100 grand prize for the open section (anyone is
free to enter), a $50 prize for the best performing player under 20 that is
new to tournament go, as well as a pair of custom made go bowls and some
books for the handicap divisions.

*Registration*: Preregistration is not required, but if you know you're
coming, please let us know! It would help a lot.

Please send an email to go@outfoxing.com to let us know that you're coming
(or if you've changed your mind). Do this as soon as you know you're coming
and/or as soon as you've changed your mind.

The information we need is:

- Name
- AGA number
- rank at which you plan to enter

We'll be relaying our top board on KGS. We'll need a scribe for the
tournament. If you'd like to volunteer for the position, please let us know.
Tournament information is tentative and may be subject to change. Please
visit our tournament page for up-to-date information on the event.


Even if you are not sure if you want to play, we welcome spectators. :)
Please come even just to watch.

Election Results

The election results are in. The winner is Jamie Salts.

Please welcome our new president by coming to our weekly meetings on Wednesday at HJ Patterson 1216 at 7PM and Friday at Stamp Student Union Food Court by the Baltimore Room at 4PM.

Club elections Feb. 11

Go club elections will be held Wed., Feb. 11, at the regular meeting, at 8 p.m..
We will be filling the position of president, which has become vacant.
All University of Maryland student members who come to the meeting in 1216 HJP will be eligible to vote.

Meetings over the next few weeks

We will resume Wednesday night meetings (7-11 p.m.) in 1216 HJ Patterson Hall on Feb. 4.
Tonight, Jan. 21, and next week (Jan. 28) we will meet in the Union, at the usual Friday location, near the food court (above the food co-op). On Jan. 21, we will start at 6 because the Union closes at 9. Jamie has volunteered to be there to bring the sets from the office.

Winter break schedule

The University of Maryland Go Club will continue to meet over winter break. We will meet in HJ Patterson as usual (7 pm in room 1216) on Wednesday night, tonight (Jan. 7) and next week (Jan. 14). We will meet on Jan. 21 and 28 as well, but the location is to be determined.

Upcoming Holiday Helper Tournament & a Sneak Peek at Our Spring Semester Schedule

Hi fellow go players,

According to Allen of the NOVA Go Club, there will be a Holiday Helper tournament on Saturday, December 13th, at George Mason Law School in Arlington, VA, in room 257. Further details at http://www.novagoclub.org.

There will be the 2009 John Groesch Memorial Spring Tournament coming up soon during our 2009 Spring semester. Decisions have not been finalized yet, but chances are likely that the tournament will be held on the day after the Cherry Blossom, which would be March 29 (the spring NOVA tournament is tentatively scheduled for March 28). Please check back for more updates. :D

We will try deliver the new as soon as possible. :D

-Wayne

Tonight's participation in Asia Night

Our local community is having an Asia Night at the Multipurpose Room, Nyumburu Cultural Center, from 7-9pm. Our own club will be participating in this event as well as having our usual meeting at 1216 HJ Patterson as well at 7-11 pm. Please come and join us!

Afterwards it was another successful event. One of the performers came over to play for a bit at the end before the maintenance personnel told us that we had to go.

Here are some pictures taken by us during the event.

5 victories at the GW-Rockville-UMCP team matches on Nov. 14th

We went against Cedar Lane and Rockville. Cedar Lane had 8 wins, UMCP had 5 wins, and Rockville had 2 wins. The people who participated on our team were Kuo, Jeremy, Matt, Steve-John, Jamie, and Wayne. Good job to them all.