12.03.22 Hello MECA Members! It is time to elect Officers and Directors of the Maine Chess Association for the upcoming term. The members we elect this month will assume their positions on January 1, 2023, and provide leadership to MECA for one or two years, depending on position. Officers are elected for a two-year term, while Directors are elected for one year. Some candidates have chosen to submit brief statements, and those are provided below.

Thanks to Maine Chess Association Secretary Kate Ervin for preparing this ballot.

Please click on this link to submit your ballot by December 31, 2022 at 11:59pm:

Maine Chess Association Board Election Official Ballot

Two notes:
1. We are requiring your name and email on the ballot. It is the only way we can ensure that each member votes only once, and that each vote is submitted by a MECA member in good standing.
2. If you are unsure whether your MECA membership has expired, please contact me or President Michael Dudley (mdudley@chessmaine.org), and we will let you know. If your MECA membership has lapsed, you can renew online before voting HERE

CANDIDATES

President:

John Paul Ciarrocchi

My 58-year work career has included team management positions in retail, security, and health fields. I was a Special Olympics coach/coach trainer for 26 years, including some years as a member of the Penobscot, Piscataquis, and Hancock counties management team that planned and implemented activities throughout the year for over 600 athletes. As a teaching assistant, I taught a 3-credit class in Recreational Leadership for a semester at UM-Bangor (which also served as an accreditation course for activity directors). I have experience giving interviews (TV and print) and have done public speaking.
My chess interest began with the Fischer-Spassky match. I have enjoyed playing class-level chess over the years and am a former secretary of the UMO Chess Club.
There is a 2016 interview in the Profiles section of chessmaine.net that gives some further information about my background.
If I am selected for this opportunity to serve on the MECA board, I will do my best to support MECA's mission for the growth of chess in Maine. Thank you!

Vice President:

Dan DeLuca

Dan DeLuca has been involved with the Maine chess community since moving to the state in 1995. Dan is a player, coach, US Chess Senior Tournament Director, FIDE National Arbiter, FIDE Instructor, current vice president of MECA, and web editor of ChessMaine.net. He is the coach of the US National Deaf Chess Team and managed the team's participation at the 2019 Deaflympics in Chiavenna, Italy. Dan is also one of the founding members and current secretary of the American Chess Association of the Deaf (ACAD).

Secretary:

Aaron Spencer

Hello MECA members, my name is Aaron. I have been playing chess competitively in Maine for 16 years (off and on) and am currently serving on the MECA board. These days I'm playing a little less, but I still want to support the Maine chess community that I love and grew up with. I strive to bring my enthusiasm for the game and the community to the secretary position, and help make sure that MECA can thrive and provide for the chess community for years to come. I also encourage all MECA members, board members or not, to stay connected and share any ideas and opinions to the board members to make 2023 the greatest year for Maine chess on the books. See you all over the board!

Treasurer:

Wyatt Hendrix

My name is Wyatt Hendrix and I am a college student studying Economics at the University of Maine in Orono. I was previously Secretary of the Maine Chess Association from 2019-2022, and a board member in 2018. Since 2016, I have played in more than 150 rated events throughout Maine and am consistently Maine's most active player. I am also a USCF certified tournament director, running my first tournament in January 2019 as a 17 year-old (the first Maine Blitz Championship). I worked closely with the outgoing administration to usher in a new era for MECA and Maine chess, and am excited to work with the incoming administration to make 2023 and beyond the best years yet for chess in Maine.

Directors (Choose 4):

Stevie Baston

Justin Fisette

I am a teacher at Dirigo High School in western Maine and advisor of our school's burgeoning chess club. The Maine Chess Association has helped our school chess club go from a passion project of a few students to us successfully competing at several tournaments. I am running for a position on the board to pay the help I got forward. I am grateful for all the help I have received, and I want to take an active part in helping the Maine chess world continue and to help other chess clubs (particularly scholastic clubs from small schools like mine) and players get the supportive environment they need to flourish.

Jorge Oliveira

I was born and raised in Brazil and moved to America in my early adulthood. I'm a family guy and my wife is native from Maine. We recently moved to Maine and we have a toddler, who already knows all the names of the pieces and most of their moves, with a special love for Knights! I've been involved with chess wherever I went for 30 years. I learned it as a child and it became part of my life. I represented my city back in Sao Paulo state in Brazil for many years and was always involved with our local city club. While going through school here in the US, I founded and presided a chess club at Ensign College for two years and helped run another one at Brigham Young University - Idaho for a year. I currently teach private students in southern Maine, volunteer as a coach at Wiscasset Middle High School chess club and as a guest speaker at Windham Middle School chess club. I love chess and I also love to serve. When I heard that MECA was in need of people to serve, I thought about putting those two things together once more.

Will Ravn

Hayden Tittle

I work as an ELL Teacher at Lewiston High School. I grew up playing Scholastic Chess in North Carolina, but stepped away from the game for a lot of years when I started playing soccer full time. During the Pandemic, I rekindled my love of Chess and found opportunities to use Chess to connect with students at Lewiston High School and in our community in Lisbon Falls. I've greatly enjoyed developing many positive relationships in the MECA community over the past 18 months and growing the Chess culture in Lewiston/Lisbon Falls. I see serving on the MECA board as an additional opportunity to give back to an organization, community & sport that has meant a lot to me throughout various stages of my childhood and adult life.