About Us
Kaleb Lancman
Co-founder, Co-president and Digital Media Manager
I was born in New York into a family of first-generation immigrants from Argentina. My dad taught me how to play chess when I was 3 years old. My love for the game only grew when I joined my school chess team in the 4th grade at PS 59. Since then, over the years, I have competed in many tournaments both nationally and internationally including Canada and even Israel.
Good chess players develop strong study skills. Chess requires learning chess theory, memorizing, time management and especially planning and strategy. Not surprisingly, these skills can really help to become a strong student and do well in school. Last year, I put in a lot of effort preparing for the entrance exam (SHSAT) and was able to get into Stuyvesant, a New York specialized high school. I believe that my years of chess training was a major help in this.
A big part of my identity has to do with being Latino and speaking Spanish. Although the majority of children enrolled in NYC public schools are Latino, their numbers are very small in the NYC specialized high schools. When I started on this project, my goal was to change this one kid at a time by working with those children teaching them chess and helping them be better students. More recently, with the flow of migrant children arriving to NYC, we contacted Coach Russ, our elementary school coach, and came up with the idea of launching a program specially designed for these newly arrived children. Our goal is to welcome them through in-school chess programs and a drop-in, after-school program during which they will learn chess and English and have a safe space.
Kyle Lancman
Co-founder and Co-president
I am 15 years old and am a rising sophomore in Stuyvesant High School. My family is from Argentina and I grew up speaking Spanish. I am from NYC and I love to play chess. I learned to play chess when I was 3 years old and started playing tournaments when I was around 8 years
old. I have always been fascinated with chess because of the complexity and variability of the game.
I am rated in the USCF at 2200+ which means that I am considered a “chess master.” Some of my accomplishments include being co-champion of the New York State Scholastic Championship in 2019 and winning the gold medal in the 2022 Maccabiah Games Under 18 chess tournament.
Chess has made me who I am today. Because of it, I can face challenges head on, I pick myself up and go back in even after a loss, and I have probably spent at least a thousand hours studying chess with my coaches and alone. Those practices and skills have also helped me
become a very good student and helped me get to where I am today.
The reason I want to be part of this project is because I want to give other Spanish-speaking kids like me the opportunity to benefit from the study of chess (like I did). The news keeps mentioning many migrant kids from Latin American countries arriving in NYC; this was concerning to my family and led me to talk with the director of my old chess program to see how we could help. My goal is to make these children feel welcomed and to teach them to love this game that has helped me so much when I was growing up.
Sascha Gordon Zolov
Vice-president
I believe that every person should learn to play chess as I find it to have a multitude of intellectual impacts that can greatly impact one’s ability to interact with the world around them. Chess helps children (or anyone!) develop the ability to think and concentrate deeply, to be patient, and to gain a deeper logical understanding of the world.
Roughly three years ago, I moved to Chile for six months. Everything was entirely in Spanish (as one should expect!) and I had to make due with what little of the language I knew at the time. That experience really taught me how difficult it is to be in an environment surrounding a language you don’t speak. This motivated me to become a part of this project, as I want to help any migrant children placed in a world that doesn’t speak their language feel more at home.
For me, my love of chess isn’t so simple as a draw to the puzzle behind it, or the calculation that comes with the game. I’ve realized that there’s true value in being a part of a team with so many people passionate about the same hobby. Working with people around you gives you a stronger drive to continue learning, to continue your passion. This, fundamentally, is what drew me to Unidos Podemos Mas, as I strongly support the idea of giving children the opportunity to work with people similar to them in such an intellectual space.
Victor Casado
Parent coordinator
I am 16 years old, and thanks to chess I am entering my third year at Stuyvesant High School. Chess has helped me a lot in my life and I want to help others with it as well.
I started to play chess as a kid, and since that time, this game has been a big part of my life.
Chess taught me how to think strategically and to think before I act. These lessons have stayed with me until now and have become a big part of my personality.
The reason I want to be a part of this project is that I want to offer others the same opportunities that I had with chess. When I saw the news stories that spoke of the immigrants arriving from Latin America, I realized that this was a perfect opportunity to help. I want to help these kids learn this game which has had such a positive influence in my life and I through this I also want to help them establish themselves in the USA.
Krish Bhandari
Outreach Manager
Krish Bhandari is a high school junior hailing from Stuyvesant High School in New York, NY. His accomplishments include being a real one, being an EX-competitive Fortnite player, and being the realest one.
He is very interested in chess, in which he has been a FIDE Candidate Master since August 2023 and the vice president of the chess club at his school. He is also interested in math competitions, with his best scores being a 109.5 on the 2022 Fall AMC 10B and a 6 on the 2023 AIME I.
Outside of academia, he enjoys working out, spirituality, sending mind-numbingly stupid Instagram reels to his friends, and digital art.
Christopher Louie
Social Media Director
I am 16 years old and am a rising junior in Stuyvesant High School. Like Kyle and Kaleb, I am from NYC and I love to play chess. I learned to play chess when I was in first grade at 7 years old, and began tournament play at age 9. I enjoy playing chess because chess is very fun to play and gets you to think a lot. It also isn’t very hard to learn with a bit of practice.
I am rated in the USCF at 1950, just below master level, and play with Kyle and Kaleb on the Stuyvesant High School Chess Team. Chess has helped me grow into the person I am today, by helping me grow smarter and also meet many new people. As part of this project, I hope to serve as a mentor helping Spanish-speaking kids learn chess, providing an opportunity that has translated well into my own life, and something that hopefully will help others as well.