BCS Alumna Nazee Moghadam: A young chess champion grows up
"She was always up for a challenge - and still is."
BCS and Berkeley Bishops alumna Nazee Moghadam and her mother Delicia stopped by the Berkeley Chess School to say hello before Nazee returned to the University of California at San Diego (UCSD), where she starts her senior year this fall. In addition to her studies, Nazee will be applying to law school while teaching chess at three San Diego schools.
Nazee is the eldest of three veteran chess champions for BCS. Nazee, her younger brother Ahmad and younger sister Mahnoosh all excelled in regional and state tournaments throughout their elementary and middle-school years.
What is your earliest chess memory?
(Mother Delicia chimes in): At the age of six months, she was on her dad’s shoulders watching while he played computer chess. Later, when she was two years old, Nazee would secretly remove pieces from the chessboard whenever her dad stepped away from it.
What are the main gifts chess has given you?
Nazee: The game has (first of all) humbled me and taught me to adapt to a lot of different social situations. It’s also made me patient and enabled me to sit down and solve problems. I remember in middle school playing one game for five hours. It’s also helped me not to be intimidated by guys.
Delicia: When she first started chess, it was very male-dominated and the boys made fun of her. At one tournament I attended, another mother came over to me and asked, "Do you realize your daughter is the only girl at this tournament? Doesn’t it bother you?" I said, "No, I’m hoping it will make her stronger and to learn not be intimidated – to know she can accomplish things [as well as the boys can]." She was always up for a challenge, and still is.
In subsequent years, as more girls started to participate in chess, Nazee played at many Sojourner Truth tournaments, a tournament for female K-12 and adult players.
Nazee: The game gives you so many perspectives – it lets you look at all the aspects of a situation before making a decision or forming an opinion. This last aspect informs my attitude towards politics as well. As an Independent, I like to look at all sides of an issue before choosing the one I think works best.
Chess and her long experience with the Berkeley Bishops team also made many lasting friendships for Nazee and her siblings. Up until Nazee left for college, the Moghadams would hold an annual get-together for former teammates and classmates from their Berkeley Chess School years.
Nazee: In high school I was in the hospital, and when I got out of the ICU I found my hospital room covered floor to ceiling with flowers, cards and gifts. At least half of them were from my chess friends and their parents.
More About Nazee
Nazee officially started her chess career in third grade at Harding Elementary with BCS veteran chess instructor Mark Brown. BCS President Elizabeth Shaughnessy quickly became a mentor and a close family friend. From there, the Moghadam siblings took advantage of almost every opportunity to participate in BCS chess: they took Friday Night Chess classes and summer camps, played on the Berkeley Bishops team and went to Ireland on an exchange program with an Irish school in 2000.
Then the trophies started accumulating: in fifth and sixth grades, Nazee and her siblings, together with the Yun brothers, took first place at the BCS team tournament with Nazee on Board 1, Ahmad on Board 3 and Mahnoosh on Board 5. In fourth grade, Ahmad placed first in the K-8 division at the California State Scholastic championship and was an active participant in Bishops intramural play. In sixth grade, Nazee and Mahnoosh, then in first grade, took first in their respective grade levels for the Sojourner Truth All Girls National Championships.
Nazee stopped taking chess during high school – "it was hard to balance everything while applying to college" – but she still assisted in organizing chess tournaments and was a scholastic representative for the Northern California Chess Association for two years.
At UCSD, Nazee chose to major in political science with a concentration in public law. In her senior year she will be interning with SD Assemblyman Joel Anderson and teaching chess at three San Diego schools while preparing for the LSAT and applying to law school.
"Chess has helped my studying for the LSAT," says Nazee. "The logic games are similar to chess in reasoning it out."
Posted 9/13/09