ABOUT
Meet Coach Drew
A structured chess program run personally by an experienced coach who treats every school as a partner — not a contractor's afterthought.
PHOTO COMING SOONABOUT TEMPO CHESS ACADEMY
Tempo Chess Academy is a structured, results-driven chess program for K–8 students, run personally by an experienced coach and brought directly to your child’s school. No franchise and no rotating contractors — one accountable coach who treats every campus as a partner.
WHY I STARTED TEMPO
I started Tempo Chess Academy because I wanted to build something of my own — everything I know about chess and everything I believe about kids, in one place. The name says it: in chess, tempo means seizing the initiative and never wasting a move. That’s how I teach, and it’s the mindset that led me to build this.
MEET THE FOUNDER — COACH DREW
I sat down at my first chess board at seven years old, and it became the through line of my life. I grew up playing everywhere I could in Miami, and as a senior I helped start my high school’s first chess club — we took first place in the state, and I finished third individually. In my early twenties, I ran my younger siblings’ elementary chess club for three years and discovered I loved teaching the game even more than playing it. After moving to Houston, I returned to coaching professionally and have now spent twelve semesters across more than twenty North Houston schools, building and refining my own curriculum. For the last two years, I’ve been the coach that new instructors shadow before running their own programs. I’m also a father of three — when you trust me with your child for an hour each week, you’re getting someone who treats that time exactly the way I’d want a coach to treat mine.
HOW I TEACH
Every class follows a simple, dependable rhythm: a lesson, real games, and free play before cleanup. Once a student can play a complete game, I set up weekly matches in a tournament format, where each result shapes the next week’s matchups — building toward a full in-season tournament and keepsakes at the end of the semester. Through all of it, I hold to four things: fun, learning, safety, and respect. I’m not a grandmaster, and I don’t need to be — what I can do is take a child from never having touched a piece to playing confidently in the 1500–1600 range, strong enough that competitive chess becomes a door they can choose to open.
OUR GOAL
My goal is to make great chess instruction a normal part of every Houston-area school, and to give every student who wants it a real path from their first move to competitive play.
“I've sat across the board from hundreds of kids. The ones who struggle the most at first are almost always the ones who grow the most. Chess has a way of finding you.”
GREAT THINGS START SMALL
By the Numbers
Every program starts small and grows with effort. These are a few of the results that effort has produced.
students at one campus — now its biggest enrichment program
students who have brought home tournament trophies
first-ever team championship — first place overall