Chess study group?

I never heard of a “study group”, until I saw the movie “Paper Chase”, about Harvard students in law school.

I think the study group is an excellent idea, where participants save time and effort by sharing their knowledge. It is not just the sharing of knowledge, but knowledge that has already been filtered, selected because it is unique, novel, creative, unusual and missed by the rest of the group. In effect, putting into operation the theme “to know what everyone knows, is to know nothing”.

This study group idea would seem to work well for improvement in chess.

Gather a group of 4 or 2 to play and study chess. Where every week, each participant has a contract to contribute some chess idea he thinks is interesting, important or unique. Nothing too elaborate, just an exchanged of chess ideas that are important and have a low profile. Sorta like a chess club, but with a focus an getting better, not just playing.

This sort of chess study group will work only if the participants want to improve at a similar rate. Given that one person in the group may have his interests too diversified and not be able to contribute to the pool of knowledge as others want and need. This could be remedied by having a larger group, but then this has some disadvantages.

Bottom line, this social approach to chess improvement might help, instead of going at it alone. Why jog/walk alone, when you can join others on the same path.