The second edition of the Amsterdam Chess Open will be bigger and better in many ways compared to 2023, and this is largely thanks to the collaboration between the tournament and the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences (AUAS). A conversation with Jeroen Visser, Director of Operations of the Faculty of Business and Economics (FBE) at the AUAS, reveals that this partnership is actually a very natural one.
After the first successful edition last year at the Cygnus Gymnasium, the organisers of the Amsterdam Chess Open were satisfied but also hungry for more. Especially, more participants should be possible, but that would require a different location. Jan Timmerman, chairman of the tournament committee and lecturer in commercial economics at the AUAS, decided to send an email to Jeroen Visser, and that got the ball rolling. It helped that Visser had enjoyed playing chess as a child.
“My default response to most questions is to say yes,” says Jeroen Visser during a conversation on a Tuesday morning in October in his office. “And especially because it’s chess, where there’s a personal touch point for me, but also because I think it fits perfectly with us as a knowledge institution. I discussed it with a few colleagues here, and we quickly reached an agreement.”
The fact that the tournament falls during the autumn break is a bonus but was not necessarily a requirement. “At other times, we would have looked at how we could make it happen too,” says Visser. “When it comes to things like this, I always think: we could focus on the impossibilities, but chess is the game of seemingly infinite possibilities, right? So, it's more about looking at how we can make it work and, given the situation, what move we’re going to play, but with the mindset: we want to do this.”
In the Amsterdamse Poort, right behind the AUAS location, is the Open Space Contemporary Art Museum (OSCAM), a museum in Southeast Amsterdam focused on artists from that area. The AUAS also collaborates with them, and there’s a link with chess. “The first artists in residence they had, artists who called themselves The New Originals, created a large, blue chess set,” Visser explains. “That was also one of the reasons we placed a large chessboard in our building, because we noticed it was being used a lot.” The partnership with the ACO can be seen as the next step in this trajectory.
Broad collaboration
The collaboration consists of various elements. The most important is that the beautiful location, the Corry Tendeloo House in Southeast Amsterdam, is being made available, including IT facilities and catering. Around twenty AUAS staff are expected to be active during the tournament, including caretakers, IT support, cleaning staff, set-up crew, and communications teams.
“The great thing is that it’s not just coming from this faculty,” says Visser. “It’s also about facility services, IT services... Various departments at the AUAS are saying: we’re behind this, we want to support it. There are people working during the autumn break, who would otherwise have time off, to make this possible. It’s really something where people are saying: okay, we want this, and we want to participate.”
There’s also already some collaboration on subject content, which may be expanded in the future. First-year students from the Commercial Economics programme organised a pre-event in May, supervised by ACO board members Marjolein Aarten and Jan Timmerman, aimed at reaching home chess players. They developed a marketing communication plan, and the event took place at the Max Euwe Centre, where Grandmaster Paul van der Sterren gave a masterclass specifically for less experienced chess players.
“We are now working on plans to involve other AUAS faculties in the ACO, and vice versa, to contribute to the students’ learning development,” says Timmerman. “For example, the Faculty of Health, Sports, and Movement could contribute and learn from a large-scale event like the ACO. We could also take steps in (international) marketing communication, where the Faculty of Business and Economics could play a role.”
Connections
The partnership between the ACO and the HvA is not illogical given the many areas of contact between chess and the university of applied sciences – think of aspects like knowledge, training and didactics. A concrete example of this is that the chess event uses tournament coaches so that participants can learn something from their games in a structured way. Four tournament coaches have been appointed: Van der Sterren and IM Merijn van Delft for groups A and B and Ewoud de Groote and Ashley Krishnasing for groups C and D.
The focus on training and didactics was also a reason for Visser to be enthusiastic about the collaboration from the start. “I think chess as a sport aligns very well with what we want to be as a knowledge institution,” he says. “It’s also about vitality, development, sportsmanship, about how you can continue to improve. It’s mainly about the process. Learning chess is primarily about learning how to think, and that’s something we focus on a lot at a university of applied sciences. You start with a problem, and then the question is always: how do you approach it?”
“I also find it interesting to see the different types of students,” Visser continues. “In chess, you have people who play more theoretically, and people who play more intuitively. That’s something you also see with our students. You have students who like to know in advance: what do I need to learn, and students who first dive in and then look back and say: well, how did that actually turn out? I see a strong connection there. But also, the game itself, chess, is about meeting each other, finding common ground, and setting boundaries.”
“When I think of our Commercial Economics students, for instance, I could generalise and say: they might be more attacking players, who like to play with white and take the initiative. If I look at Accountancy students, or those more in the finance area, they might naturally think: well, I'll open with the Caro-Kann, keeping things a bit more closed.”
Do people’s personalities translate into how they approach a chess game? Visser thinks so. “Or perhaps the opposite, that people have a way to be someone else for a change and do something entirely different,” he adds. “But that’s what I love about it: it’s such a deeply layered game, and that depth is what we hope to achieve with our students too. Even the question of how you reach someone is like a chess game, it's a quest. How you as a teacher interact with students is also like chess, or how you design a curriculum – those kinds of things.”
Partner in the City
The partnership also fits into a broader vision of the university regarding its place in the city, Visser explains. “One important reason is that we at the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences believe it's important to be a partner in the city. The city is celebrating its 750th anniversary, and this is one way for us to think: this is how we can contribute to the celebration and to the strength of Amsterdam, which lies in its diversity, with chess as a unifying element.”
One of the thoughts behind this is that Southeast Amsterdam is particularly a great location, Visser notes. “Chess isn’t dependent on language barriers; it’s hugely popular around the world, and in that way, it can serve as a beautiful bridge between cultures. There are 180 nationalities living here, just in Southeast. I think chess is a wonderful unifier, especially for young people.”
“Part of the initial plan for 'AUAS and the city' was also: we truly give something back to the neighbourhood we’re part of. We’re not here just to 'consume the land' but also to establish connections with the rest of the environment. That's the case at the Wibauthuis, and also here in this district.”
Various Impacts
Visser indicates that he envisions multiple impacts with the partnership. “It’s about several things: strengthening the connection within the neighbourhood, raising awareness about chess among many people here, and of course, increasing the name recognition of the AUAS,” he says. “I also think the threshold to start playing chess will be lower for many people than the threshold to step into the AUAS if they’ve never been here or don’t have family here. You might think: that’s quite a big step, but if you’re already playing chess, you might think: let me have a look because now I have a good reason to go. That could be an additional effect.”
“But this isn’t the main goal for us. If we really look deeply at the essence of what we are as AUAS, as a knowledge institution, it's not necessarily about us believing that everyone should come study here. I think if we, as AUAS, can say: thanks to us, people have developed themselves, that doesn’t have to happen within our school.”
“I imagine a child from Southeast hearing about the chess tournament, participating, becoming enthusiastic, thinking: I want to get better at this, and developing because of it, but never actually setting foot inside the AUAS again. In that case, I would already consider the tournament a success. It's much more about the vision that we, as AUAS, want to help the city of Amsterdam, help its residents, and specifically the residents of Southeast. It doesn’t have to be lofty or complicated. It can also be as simple as two people who might live next door to each other but don’t know each other, meeting through chess, saying: hey, do you play chess too? And from now on, seeing each other every Monday evening to play a game. I think we can find success in those small moments.”
Last summer, the World Gymnaestrada was held in Amsterdam, and there was also collaboration with AUAS. “That involved thousands of people,” Visser explains. “We made our buildings available for participants to stay overnight here. That’s another great example of how we, as AUAS, want to be active in the city, with initiatives that we believe help the city and its residents.”
The Future
The partnership and agreements are, in principle, only for this year, but Visser already has ideas about the future. “We’re starting now, and we’ll see how it goes for both sides. At the same time, we don’t engage in these kinds of initiatives just to do something once. It comes from the idea that this is one of the ways we, as AUAS, want to be active in the city.”
Diversity and inclusion are important themes in society and may become even more so in the coming years. In that sense, Visser sees alignment with the partnership: “Chess is an incredibly inclusive sport. Once you know the rules, the possibilities are endless, yet it remains very accessible. If you look at the essence of the game, anyone can play it. I remember from my own youth when I was part of a chess club, there was a man who had no arms. They had made rings on the chess pieces, and he moved them with his mouth. This was one of those moments for me where I thought: yes, what does it really matter?”
“I truly believe that chess represents a sport where you can find connection but also engage in an intellectual challenge. As AUAS, we want to be a place where you can safely take on intellectual challenges, both with yourself and others. I think that's something we find super important. And, more specifically, we want to explicitly invite everyone in the Southeast district to participate or come watch. We’re just enthusiastic that we have the opportunity to collaborate in this way!”