Our Board and Staff

Mike Lueken: Secretary

Mike Lueken is the president and owner of General Marine Services, Inc. Mike has been extremely active in the community through a number of different enterprises over the years.  He was appointed by Gov. John Ashcroft to a six-year term on the 22nd Judicial Commission and to the St. Louis Election Board as Secretary from 2003-2005 by Gov Holden. He also represented the City of Saint Louis to the board of directors for the Saint Louis Zoo. Mike is a member of Saint Peters Catholic Church and is currently a school board member and serves on the curriculum committee. He is active as co-chair with his wife Laura implementing the St. Peters SPICE initiative to help children with special needs find the assistance they need early in their grade school education.  He is proud to be a lifetime board member of the Saint Louis Chess Club.

Ed Baur: Board of Directors

Ed Baur taught chemistry and mathematics at Rosary High school from 1969 to 1991 and coached the chess team there from 1975 to 1991. After that, he taught the same courses and coached the chess team at Vianney High School from 1991 until his retirement in 2007. He continues to coach the Vianney chess team in his retirement. Ed has been a member of the Missouri Chess Association Board of Directors for 14 years, and president for six years. The author of the instructional chess book, "Griffin Chess," Ed lives in Saint Louis and teaches chess at Saint Louis Community College.

Doug Eckert: Board of Directors

Doug Eckert, CPA, moved back to the Saint Louis area in May of 2011 when he joined Brown Smith Wallace to lead the firm’s international tax practice. He was the 1983 and 1984 U.S. Junior Open Champion and achieved his FIDE Master title in 1986. Doug also is an International Master in correspondence chess and a five-time Missouri State Open Champion. While attending the University of Missouri-Columbia in 1986, Eckert authored a book entitled, Sicillian Schevenigen: Keres Attack. A licensed CPA, Eckert earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Accountancy from the University of Missouri – Columbia. He resides in Chesterfield with his wife and three children.

Mike Podgursky: Board of Directors

Michael Podgursky is Professor of Economics at the University of Missouri – Columbia, where he served as department chair from 1995-2005. His research focuses on the economics of education. He has written many articles in the area, with a primary focus on school finance, educator compensation, and human resource policy in schools. He serves on the board of editors of several academic journals including Education Finance and Policy and Education Next, advisory boards for various statistical agencies and research institutes, and was a fellow of the George W.Bush Institute from 2010-2013. He is a co-investigator at the National Center on Performance Incentives at Vanderbilt University, and the Center for Analysis of Longitudinal Data in Education Research at AIR, two national research centers funded by the Institute of Education Sciences (IES) of the U.S. Department of Education, and is a founding board member of the Show-Me Institute. He has a strong research interest in the scholastic value of chess for elementary and secondary students.

Jean Hoffman: Board of Directors

Jean Hoffman is a nonprofit consultant and educator. Jean has spent the majority of her career working to promote the benefits of chess to under-served and under-represented populations. From 2013-2017, she served as the Executive Director of the United States Chess Federation. Prior to that, Jean co-founded the nonprofit organization 9 Queens with Jennifer Shahade, the two time US Women's Champion and FIDE Women's Grandmaster. She also worked as the general manager for the online sites Wuchess/Chesspark.com, and for the New York city based non-profit organization Chess-in-the-Schools.

Our Staff