A natinal master might be helpful. Unless the kid is really really good at chess, it will take many many hours to improve.
My son played chess, not even reaching 2000. It is an interesting EC. He had other spikes, and Chess might helped him a little for his application.
However, i have to say Chess is a wonderful EC; it is a really great training activity for handling "frustration". He had suffered lots of lost in games and learned how to handle frustration. We did not feel regretful on choosing it, and felt my son had learned a lot from it.
