Just saw that Mark Morss' chess student Abby Marshall shared first prize in The second annual Susan Polgar National Invitational for Girls.

As "Each co-champion was awarded a full tuition and fees scholarship (value more than $40,000 each) to the University of Texas", it's sure sounds nice that skill at chess can be just as beneficial for one's future as basketball and american football etc.

So congratulations!  Btw, I hope the KG served her well!

http://chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=2605

On a further note, it's nice to see that chess in the US may be on the rise again, thanks to the Polgars and Maurice Ashley's giant tm recently. Hopefully the interest will increase even more and spill over to Europe!