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Quebec Youth Championships and CYCC qualifier : $8100 in prizes
Quebec Youth Championships and CYCC qualifier : $8100 in prizes
The tournament will be held from January 16 to January 18, 2015 for sections U18-U16-U14-U12, from January 17 to January 18 for section U10 and on January 18 for section U8.
The tournament will be a qualifier for the 2015 CYCC in Windsor, Ontario. Prizes for each section : 1st $1000, 2nd $250, to be used for the 2015 CYCC ; 3rd $100 in CMA gift-certificates.
The top three players from each section will win a spot on Team-Quebec 2015, in addition to a trophy (prizes and trophies are only for players residing in Quebec since at least 1 year).
Re: Quebec Youth Championships and CYCC qualifier : $8100 in prizes
Thank you Felix.
So, here we go again... with female players hitting a brick wall intentionally erected by the FQE. :( Despite all the animated discussions and protests by parents last year, the 2015 formula you just published is actually _worse_ for young girls than in 2014. It is quite unfortunate to have to repeat the same arguments every year, with everything falling on deaf ears.
1) Since 2014, the FQE explicitly styles the Championnat jeunesse (QYCC) as the CYCC qualifier, using the prestige of the CYCC and even some exaggerations in publicity to attract more participants to the QYCC.
How, then, can the FQE conveniently "forget" despite all the protests that the CYCC is played under different rules and different format, i.e., in a gender-segregated fashion, with boys playing in Open U08 - Open U18, and girls in Girls U08 - Girls U18?! All other provinces hold their qualifiers according to the format of the main event. They have separate Open and Girls sections, and rules on merging (if there is not enough girls registered) generally follow the CFC Handbook 702, e.g., sections are merged by gender, vertically, not by age, horizontally. Quebec is the only one that willingly and deliberately liquidates Girls sections and forces all female players to register in the Open sections.
Think about it for a moment. If a meet to qualify for Team Canada for 100m sprint in summer Olympics was set in such a way that women were forced to run in the same heats as men, and only top 3 overall would make a team or get prizes, wouldn't the organizers be laughed out of the stadium by the IOC, the IAAF and our own Canadian public?! This is exactly the same situation. The FQE is free to organize any events in any format, but when it sells an event to the public as a qualifier for a national event, it has to make sure that players _at least_ compete in the same discipline as in that main event. Since the CYCC rules explicitly specify that girls compete in "female chess" (and for those who'd want to argue about the wisdom of doing so, the clear argument is that the CYCC is the qualifier to the WYCC and therefore follows the WYCC format) a qualifying event has to provide to the girls an opportunity to compete among themselves only.
2) To a straw man argument that is always paraded as a first automatic response: "There is not enough girls registering for the QYCC to justify having separate girls sections" - we, the parents, say: "It is exactly because you discriminate against them and stack the deck against them that many smart girls don't want to register in such a tournament!" If you, the FQE, don't care about girls and don't know how to attract them, just give this qualifier to Larry Bevand and the AEM - not forgetting, of course, to allocate the prize fund from the FQE's fonds de développement jeunesse! - and you will see how this tournament will blossom and there will be as many girls playing as they are in Ontario!
3) Vlad, Bob G., Fred, CFC Governors from Quebec and other provinces:
Could you please give the CFC's view on the matter?
4) The very unfortunate aspect is that many Quebec parents who have a privilege to have daughters, including myself, already had this discussion with the FQE last year. As you probably remember, the FQE wouldn't budge - until someone pointed out that the Ministere de l'Education, du Loisir et du Sport was prominently listed as a tournament sponsor, and offered to call the Ministere, or the Secrétariat à la condition féminine Québec, and ask them how do they regard their sponsorship and relations with the FQE in view of the blatant gender discrimination. Surprisingly, the very next week the rules of the 2014 Championnat jeunesse were bent, the new flyers printed instead of the old ones to give some token recognition to girls - and the parents were told by the two people in position of authority that things will be done "completely right" in 2015.
As I hold those FQE people in high respect, I wouldn't like to believe that we cannot rely on their word. Do anxious parents need to jump through the hoops every year? As a FQE member and supporter, I am horrified that the FQE seems to be digging itself such a hole, practically inviting a class-action lawsuit that would tarnish its image. I hope very much that the advertisements you published are just an honest error, a regrettable oversight on the part of the FQE, which will be fixed decisively, once and for all.
Re: Quebec Youth Championships and CYCC qualifier : $8100 in prizes
The details (including sections and prizes) of the tournament were decided by the executive. I can't tell how the meeting went, but I gladly advertize the tournament.
What I can do is give my own opinion on the subject. As I repeated quite a few times in the past, I'm not in favour of girls-only section for kids. The strongest girls we had (Maïli-Jade Ouellet, Myriam Roy, Chang Yun, Kelly Wang) became strong by playing against the strongest players they could, not taking the easy way around. Furthermore, if we look at the past Quebec Youth Championships, many girls won their sections ahead of the boys. Some years, there was as many girls as boys winning their section. Boys and girls are not segregated in most (all?) other mental sports or contests. I am all in favour of giving additionnal prizes to girls, and was slightly disappointed not to see any this year, but treating women as intellectually inferior to men by giving them their own section doesn't seem like a solution to me.
If the issue is really about CYCC qualification, girls that have a chance in their CYCC section will have absolutely no trouble scoring 50% against boys.
Many other qualifiers do not have sections for girls.
Last edited by Felix Dumont; Monday, 13th October, 2014, 12:26 AM.
Re: Quebec Youth Championships and CYCC qualifier : $8100 in prizes
Thank you again Felix. It is always a pleasure to debate with a bright opinionated person like you, and I'm gladly doing it in the current post. However, let's treat this strictly as an aside - since you and I represent ourselves only, my questions above remain addressed to the FQE and the CFC brass, and I would appreciate hearing their response.
What I can do is give my own opinion on the subject. As I repeated quite a few times in the past, I'm not in favour of girls-only section for kids. The strongest girls we had (Maïli-Jade Ouellet, Myriam Roy, Chang Yun, Kelly Wang) became strong by playing against the strongest players they could, not taking the easy way around. Furthermore, if we look at the past Quebec Youth Championships, many girls won their sections ahead of the boys. Some years, there was as many girls as boys winning their section. Boys and girls are not segregated in most (all?) other mental sports or contests. I am all in favour of giving additionnal prizes to girls, and was slightly disappointed not to see any this year, but treating women as intellectually inferior to men by giving them their own section doesn't seem like a solution to me.
Unfortunately, this is exactly the patronizing attitude that feminism in the West targeted as early as 50 years ago. I am saddened to see it rise its ugly head among young people like you - and in Quebec, among all places!
Please understand that it is not up to a bunch of old white men to decide how young girls will "become strong". The girls themselves are perfectly capable of selecting their own paths. The job of those old men is to create a level playing field and step aside. Did you ever study what Title IX is and how it revolutionized the North American sports?
Your gratuitous insult of
> taking the easy way around
>
is exactly what the feminists (leave alone suffragettes!) faced when they demanded equal opportunity and equal funding.
Two e-mails in less than an hour after my post raised an interesting question that by denying this equal funding for females to participate in the national events the FQE might violate their Charter rights. I would like to thank my correspondents who wished to remain anonymous, as well as the person who sent me a link to the 2012 CFC-FQE agreement which includes the following wording:
"Les membres FQE pourront participer aux championnats nationaux canadiens aux mêmes conditions que s’ils étaient membres FCE"
, which she believes can be interpreted as the FQE members have to follow the same qualification rules as the CFC members.
Finally, your fallacy of
> treating women as intellectually inferior to men by giving them their own section
>
is so pathetic that I am sure it was just a rhetorical slip due to late hour. You cannot be serious, right? Reasonable people can discuss this issue in general, but while we have a pyramid of qualifying events QYCC --> CYCC --> WYCC, with their _sole advertised purpose_ being to chose players for the next event, each one has to follow the same format. To put it into comparable terms again, it is up to Manon Rhéaume herself whether she wants to play in the NHL, and congratulations to her on setting and achieving this goal - but to tell her that to get funding for her trip to the women's Olympic hockey tournament she would have to compete in the men's qualifier would be a travesty.
Kind regards,
--
V.T.
Last edited by Vadim Tsypin; Monday, 13th October, 2014, 01:41 AM.
Reason: French spelling errors
Re: Quebec Youth Championships and CYCC qualifier : $8100 in prizes
First of all, the comparisons with hockey or 100m sprint are plain and simply ridiculous. As the father of a young girl, I would have thought you would have realized that girls are not inferior to boys... While there might be physical differences that justify different sections for such sports, girls and boys are just as intelligent and these arguments do not apply for chess.
When I raised money for women's chess in the past, the question of the separate sections came up very often. Feminist and governement organizations were stunned to see the boys-girls system in chess and some did not want to be associated to such a segregation. Other intellectual activities do not segregate girls and boys anymore. But chess still holds to this old mentality.
Your gratuitous insult of
> taking the easy way around
>
is exactly what the feminists (leave alone suffragettes!) faced when they demanded equal opportunity and equal funding.
This is quite funny, but pretty much irrelevant.
"Les membres FQE pourront participer aux championnats nationaux canadiens aux mêmes conditions que s’ils étaient membres FCE", which she believes can be interpreted as the FQE members have to follow the same qualification rules as the CFC members.
I understand French is not first your first language (and probably not hers), but this is not at all what it means. We can analyze it if you want :
-FQE members will be able to participate in national championships at the same condititions as if they were CFC member.
That's it. It only means that being a CFC or a FQE member does not make any difference regarding their participation in the CYCC. There is no difference between FQE players who qualify in the QYCC and CFC players who qualify in a mixed (girls and boys) qualification tournament.
There are two types of debates.
I usually gladly contribute to those who are constructive. If you want to debate whether or not girls-only sections help girls, I am all open for it. I believe both sides can defended and there are lots of possible arguments.
However, this debate is all but constructive. You do not debate whether or not this is correct. You try to find ways to scare the executive so that they do what you think is best for your daughter. The government would never force the FQE to treat the girls as inferior, especially considering how successful girls are in Quebec thanks to the actual system (3/4 Quebec participants at the CYCC were girls). And your lawsuit threat is simply ridiculous.
Last year, as the organizer of the CYCC, the FQE could qualify a certain number of local players... However, we tried to find girls who would be interested and all of them were already qualified. After all, they only needed 50% to qualify.
Last edited by Felix Dumont; Monday, 13th October, 2014, 09:30 AM.
3) Vlad, Bob G., Fred, CFC Governors from Quebec and other provinces:
Could you please give the CFC's view on the matter?
Hi Vadim,
Since I am not on the executive nor a CFC Governor (voting member), the following comments are my own 2 cents,........ and not necessarily CFC policy.
I think we can all agree that more women & girls in chess is desirable. I prefer to set aside all the divisive ideological arguments, and look at girls only (sections/ tournaments) as a pragmatic idea working towards that goal.
I understand French is not first your first language (and probably not hers), but this is not at all what it means. We can analyze it if you want [...]
Indeed, Felix, French is my fourth language so I appreciate your willingness to discuss this in English which I believe is a second language for both of us, therefore providing us with comparable ease of expression. :) Thanks for taking the time to provide your personal interpretation of the clause in the Agreement, I appreciate it. Of course, it is not up to us to find out what it actually means, both federations have legal departments.
If you want to debate whether or not girls-only sections help girls, I am all open for it. I believe both sides can defended and there are lots of possible arguments.
No, I don't want to debate anything at all on the Internet message boards, I am too old and in too poor health for that. :) As I clearly stated, I treated my response to you as an aside, as a courtesy of reply, therefore, I will not be engaging in further conversation with you. I stated the purpose of my post explicitly: to obtain an "on the record" response from the CFC and the FQE, which seems to be especially important since the FQE makes one wonder about its adherence to verbal promises.
As for your "debating", in all your writings you beautifully argue with _yourself_ on the non-existing issue of qualifying, while being completely silent on the actual issue _I raised_, that of equal funding. Denying the female players access to equal funding for the participation in the national championship is gender-based discrimination.
You try to find ways to scare the executive so that they do what you think is best for your daughter. [...] And your lawsuit threat is simply ridiculous.
Wow!.. To stoop to an ad hominem attack after two posts only? :(
"I understand that English is not first your first language". :) As there is nothing in my posts that would allow you to make such vile personal accusations, namely:
Hi Vadim,
Since I am not on the executive nor a CFC Governor (voting member), the following comments are my own 2 cents,........ and not necessarily CFC policy.
I think we can all agree that more women & girls in chess is desirable. I prefer to set aside all the divisive ideological arguments, and look at girls only (sections/ tournaments) as a pragmatic idea working towards that goal.
Thank you Bob! This is indeed how successful grassroots initiatives are built, by clear-eyed pragmatists.
Re: Quebec Youth Championships and CYCC qualifier : $8100 in prizes
The rules for CYCC qualifiers are fairly flexible because we want as many organizers to hold them as possible. The rules to qualify for CYCC are that you need to score 50% in a YCC qualifier. Ideally there will be YCC sections that would mirror the divisions in CYCC and WYCC but this is not always realistic in a particular tournament or region of the country. In Windsor we usually hold multiple YCC tournaments divided by age groups. Last year we held only two or three YCCs because almost everyone qualified on the basis of the OYCC or the promotional YCC we did with the local Windsor Spitfires major junior hockey team which gave kids a YCC and a playoff hockey ticket for less than the price of a hockey ticket.
We usually hold concurrent tournaments for those who have already qualified. The girls are pretty competitive and want to play in the stronger groups and would object if we didn't let them play in the same group with the boys. I have more girls taking chess lessons than boys at the moment. Most of those are beginners under the age of 10 and as young as 6 or 7.
Great prizes, especially compared to entry fees. Wish this was not only in Quebec.
Egis,
I believe, Ontario Youth Championships provide even greater total prize fund, although Patrick call it "bursaries" and they are more evenly distributed, including girls.
Unfortunately, exact information is not readily available on the OYCC website, but in 2012, for example, 44 OYCC winners got their bursaries for CYCC participation: http://www.oycc.ca/standings/2012standings.htm
The strongest girls we had (Maïli-Jade Ouellet, Myriam Roy, Chang Yun, Kelly Wang) became strong by playing against the strongest players they could, not taking the easy way around...
Felix,
I'm glad you have mentioned Kelly Wang - she's a good example of your approach to talented girls.
If you remember, in 2008 Kelly Wang and Qiyu Zhou were competing for World Championship, and in the end they shared second-third places with the same score.
I would say, Kelly and Qiyu have a similar chess talent, and in 2008 they were of a similar chess level...
Could you compare them today?
On a related note, in the past Myriam Roy was comparable to Yuanling Yuan, but where she's now?
It would be a pity, if Maïli-Jade will follow footsteps of Myriam and Kelly, rather than Yuanling and Qiyu.
Re: Quebec Youth Championships and CYCC qualifier : $8100 in prizes
Michael, I am not sure what point you are trying to make. Yes, many players, Myriam and Kelly included, stopped playing after some time. And so do 95% of young players, both in Quebec and in Ontario. And they don't seem to regret their decision, as there are other things in life than chess.
If Quebec was that bad at retaining players, I don't think there would be as many players here as in the rest of Canada.
Regarding the OYCC, do you have numbers? In 2012 (your example), it seems like 23 players who participated in the CYCC received bursaries. The entry fee being of $175. That would amount to $4025, for a $75 OYCC entry fee.
If you look at the prizes and the entry fees of the Quebec YCC, about $10 000 is required in sponsorship (from the FQE and other sponsors) to make it possible. It seems like the OYCC must do without that amount of money, and so they do an incredible work, but that's not quite the same.
It was a real pleasure working with the OYCC organizers last year, and they did pay for quite a few registrations, but it was no where near $8100.
For what is of the distribution, last year nearly 50% of the girls who participated in the QYCC (at a $35 entry fee) got free registration for the CYCC (value of $225). For the boys, it was about 25%.
Last edited by Felix Dumont; Monday, 13th October, 2014, 03:42 PM.
For what is of the distribution, last year nearly 50% of the girls who participated in the QYCC (at a $35 entry fee) got free registration for the CYCC (value of $225).
To quote late Senator Moynihan,
" You, Sir, are entitled to your opinion. But you are not entitled to your own facts. "
Due to the FQE format and prize rules, only 16 girls participated in the 2014 QYCC. Of them, 6 received free registration for the CYCC - a prize they had to wrestle from the boys. This is exactly two times less than 12 girls who received the CYCC bursaries in Ontario in the 2012 example that Michael kindly provided.
6/16 is 37.5%, which is not "nearly 50%" by any stretch of imagination. Moreover, as a result of potential reverse discrimination caused by the same rules, three boys were denied the prizes they would have been eligible for otherwise.
Re: Quebec Youth Championships and CYCC qualifier : $8100 in prizes
With a sample of 16 people, 6 is pretty close to half. I only counted 13 girls, thus why I said nearly 50%, but I might have missed three of the younger ones.
As I said in my second post, I was also in favour of more prizes for the girls and came up with a few solutions to present to the FQE. That said, you made me realize exactly why there are so few volunteers in Quebec. Whenever someone tries to do something, there will always be a lot of people trying to spit on them. Obviously, these are always the same people that do not do anything change the situation, besides criticizing. But after reading your comments, I will simply invest my time somewhere else.
I spend nearly 1000 hours per year volunteering for chess activities, while I turned down several part-time job offers that would have been much more lucrative. I guess it's time I start thinking about myself, like many Chesstalk posters, and stop trying to promote chess among youngsters. That way I'll finally stop receiving weekly ridiculous complaints from chess parents.
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