Students at Whitney M. Young looking for an intellectually challenging way to spend their time won’t have to put their expectations in check.

Whitney is creating a chess club where students can learn, practice, and master one of the most recognizable strategy games in the world.

“I bought a chess board to bring to class to reward my students for after they finished their work,” said math teacher Jeff Friend, who plans to head the club up. “I saw such interest in it…So far we have 18 people signed up for it.”

Why so popular? Friend has a theory.

“It’s not math,” he said with a laugh. But he added that the game seems to have awoken a competitive spirit in his students. “Jokes aside, it really is a challenging game, and having seen fellow classmates get better at it, they decided that they want to get better at it. Some kids are really improving quickly.”

And though chess is fun to play, Friend also believes that it’ll help them grow as they learn the game.

“Analytical skills, attacking postures, defensive postures, thinking ahead, planning your moves out, all of those rational decisions correspond to things that we do in our regular lives,” he said. “I just like seeing them get together and have camaraderie.”