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I was just wondering how important it is. My school calls it "the highest honor a student can receive in his/her high school career" and have a whole ritualistic induction ceremony, but I doubt it's that important. Also, how much value do selective colleges place on NHS membership?

By Dave Berry on Saturday, February 09, 2002 - 08:35 am: Edit

NHS is no big deal, Lisa. The top colleges just skim over it when they see it in your application. There are too many differing selection criteria among high schools that prevent a true national benchmark for membership in NHS. It's certainly not a bad thing to have on your record, but it's far from "the highest honor a student can receive in his/her high school career," indeed. Now if you were an Intel Science Talent Seach finalist, THAT would be a truly high honor.

The whole issue of credential inflation for elite-college applicants is beginning to rival that of grade inflation at elite colleges. A while ago, I saw a newsgroup discussion implying that even being a National Merit Finalist isn't what it used to be and that, accordingly, elites considered it almost standard fare among their applicants. This is an unfortunate situation all around and I see no signs of it easing in the near future.

Bottom line for you, Lisa: Continue to do your very best and try to articulate your true passions in your application, especially in your essays. That's really all you can do.

By 1sttimecollegemom on Saturday, February 09, 2002 - 08:25 pm: Edit

It's very disappointing to hear that NHS isn't thought of very highly, at least to me. NHS is basically the only award available to our small rural high school. With no AP or honor's classes, very few EC's (no newspaper, only one club) there is no way to distinguish the students who excel in our school other than NHS. Very few students are accepted. Our NHS requires a 3.5 or above GPA, at least 5 hours of community service per semester, must be involved in the school as much as possible with what they offer for EC's. Outside employment seems to also be a big factor, showing these kids excel at most everything they do. The application for membership is huge and very few kids are accepted. I would guess maybe 6 in each class if that many. Here I thought it would look good on the son's application, so what do we put down as EC's with so little to pick from?

By Dadster on Saturday, February 09, 2002 - 08:47 pm: Edit

If the school doesn't have many good extracurricular activities, you may have to make your own. Community service, hobbies, part-time jobs, etc., can all serve as useful substitutes for school ECs.

That isn't to say that NHS is a bad thing. At most schools, though, it's more of an award than a real activity. Selective schools tend to look for ECs that require a real commitment of time and effort. It's interesting that NHS is so selective at your school; perhaps when application time comes, you could find a way to work that in (e.g., "one of six accepted").

I would really focus EC efforts on building at least one strong outside activity. Good luck, having an "extacurricular impoverished" school makes building a resume just that much more difficult.

By Andraelle Davis on Monday, June 17, 2002 - 03:12 pm: Edit

I know that some colleges do not look at National Honors Society as a high honor. I however, see it as one of the highest honors a high school student can be a part of. What I want to know however is, isn't there some National website for NHS that you can get on and look up rules for the National Society? At my high school, we just had our NHS Secretary Elect cheat on a final exam. She stole the answer key and used it to better her grade. There is no honor is cheat and therefore I think she should be off NHS, since we are an honor society. Does anyone have anything they can send me that will give my school a reason to kick her off whether they like it or not? Thank you!!

By Smiles on Monday, June 17, 2002 - 03:27 pm: Edit

Just wondering--Does the same go for the cum laude society? Thanks!

By jenniferpa on Monday, June 17, 2002 - 03:50 pm: Edit

Andraelle,

Well it shouldn't be neccessary for you to get involved in this - it should be an open and shut case. However, check this link
http://dsa.principals.org/nhs/index.html

By C.S. on Wednesday, October 23, 2002 - 09:00 pm: Edit

I missed National Honors Society by .1 GPA, I have like a 3.46 and they will not round it. I also didn't think it was fair, because half of my classes as a sophomore were junior classes. But, they told me that NHS does not even weight stuff like that. I was really crushed, but if NHS isn't such a big deal, then I'll try not to worry.

By Pomona2006 (Pomona2006) on Sunday, November 17, 2002 - 05:00 pm: Edit

NHS means nothing! It's a joke...just about anyone can get in, and colleges know that so they don't really care about it

By NYmom on Monday, November 18, 2002 - 07:16 pm: Edit

It depends on the school. At my son's school, there are only about 10 members, yet a total of 2,400 students. Many more than 10 students were eligible, but they dropped out along the process. Incredibly, many never got the good recs they needed.

By krissy ko on Wednesday, November 20, 2002 - 03:59 am: Edit

I was just wondering what the highest GPA I can get in High School.

By krissy on Wednesday, November 20, 2002 - 04:02 am: Edit

I was just wondering what the highest GPA I can get in High School. I am in the 8th grade and going to the 9th next year. What classes should I take in that year.

By anon on Monday, December 09, 2002 - 10:48 pm: Edit

At my school, to be a member of the National Honor Society, you have to have a GPA of a 4.0 at least once and maintain a 3.5 average. You don't and you are kicked out!

By irishgirl415 on Tuesday, January 14, 2003 - 05:36 pm: Edit

wow... National Honors Society DOES mean something. It sounds like those who do not like it are probably the ones not admitted. Are you folks on the admissions selection panel??? geeeeeeeeeeees!

By catholicads on Wednesday, January 15, 2003 - 06:32 pm: Edit

At our daughter's Catholic school, students must meet the advertising sales fund-raising quota for the fall play program book to qualify for National Honor Society. Over a third of the junior class is inducted in the NHS. It seems that the criteria for admission to the NHS and selectively vary widely by school.

By mom on Saturday, February 01, 2003 - 11:42 pm: Edit

my daughter has been in NHS for a year now, but because of certain circumstances she ended up with in-school suspension(known as SAC at her school). Can this get her 'kicked out' or is it based only on grades and service?

By Jenniferelaine (Jenniferelaine) on Sunday, February 02, 2003 - 01:27 pm: Edit

For our NHS, sophmore have to have a 3.75GPA (UW)..juniors and seniors have to have a 3.5, and you have to maintain that GPA all throughout high school. It used to be that NHS was just something we were invited into, and then we got a scholarship at graduation ($500-$750 apiece). But as an added bonus, this year a new bi-law was added to our charter by our sponsor, saying that we have to have 35 hours of community service to be eligible. All I have to say is that there will be no new inductees this year, or any year to come.

By Coles (Coles) on Sunday, February 02, 2003 - 06:08 pm: Edit

The daughter of the superintendent of our school systems attends my school and has a 3.5 weighted GPA and no extra curricular activities. She was inducted into NHS, while my friend who has a 4.6, basketball for 3 years (2 JV, 1 V), vice president of Spanish club, and a slew of other activities was rejected.

By anonymous on Monday, February 03, 2003 - 09:26 pm: Edit

yo NHS is so unfair, i hate kids whose parents work for their school and use them to get priveleges (don't hate kids who don't use their parents that work at their school)

By Useatoothbrush (Useatoothbrush) on Tuesday, February 04, 2003 - 01:20 am: Edit

NHS isn't honorably at my school at all. You need to have a 3.6 cum uw to get in, which isn't hard here because I'd say at least one-third of a class of 300 has that (grade inflation is a problem here that nobody accepts). 60% or more of the kids who qualify for NHS apply end of sophomore year. You have to write four BS paragraphs on community service, leadership, scholarship, and something else. I have never heard of anyone being rejected from NHS, and you don't apply unless you have the grades to begin with. There are some 120+ people in the club (juniors and seniors) each year. You do 8 hours of community service a semester to stay in good standing, and you have to keep up your GPA (not your semester grades but your cum GPA, I have a 4.0 and if I started getting all C's I'd still be in). Most of the members I have personally seen cheating to magnitudes from copying off of quizzes to stealing tests in advance and plagiarizing essays--and some of these people have been caught and *still* are allowed to be in this club! I regret wasting my time joining this club to attend once-a-month meetings where they remind us to do community service and try to make the membership requirements even more lax.

I certainly hope that colleges just ignore NHS memberships because they are meaningless in most places.

By rgb on Tuesday, February 04, 2003 - 06:20 pm: Edit

we dont even have NHS at my school... we do have CSF though, but it does not really mean anything -it's the closest thing to this NHS i keep reading about.

By Jeff on Wednesday, February 12, 2003 - 03:51 am: Edit

Alright, NHS is really full of politics and doesn't mean too much. I am an honors student and felt robbed when I didn't make it. (I have a 4.5, ranked 5 in my class, am in numerous school clubs, and completed 30 service hours at the least.) [The qualification for our NHS is 3.8 GPA, a recommendation from someone outside of your family and your teachers, so many (meaning no specified amount so they can be subjective) service hours, so many activities, a fairly good dean's record] So when I got rejected because of a few detentions and a couple saturday detentions that I was told by the Vice Principal! were not important (one for eating a candy bar, etc, the most serious one was given to me by a substitute for swearing in class) I was pretty shocked. (They still never told me whether that was the offical reason or not but since there is nothing else wrong, anyways) Almost all of my teachers couldn't believe I didn't make it. While others made it in that had about 5 service hours, or in-school suspensions (for fighting) and out-of-school suspensions (for drinking although that was a year old) or had no activities or clubs and are ranked 70th. So that shows that there is obvious favoritism. Out of a selection committee of 5 some are bound to be for you or against you not everyone is objective. My family is full of teachers and everyone of them has been involved in NHS in some way and say it is a whole lot of politics. My teachers all were in NHS and say it doesn't get you much anywhere. It can look good on an application but don't go into permanent shock if you don't get in. I still feel stupid like those awkward moments when my friends ask me when the next NHS meetings are because they forgot I didn't make it (they know I should've though) but just realize that it not the end of the world and if you are faithfully involved in a other activity (I am in student council and have done almost 20 service hours for that, or a nice looking one like TATU [teens against tobacco use] or help out with REACH [special ed] or a similar equally prestigious program) that those will help equally well. Just work hard in that another club and/or sport and that will count just as much. Or do many service hours like ones that NHS would normally do and colleges will see that as going the extra mile because a club did make you do it. As for me I just made SNHS [Spanish National Honors Society] so NHS is obviously all politics. I hope that make you feel better or helps ease your worries or something.

By Jeff on Thursday, February 13, 2003 - 02:38 am: Edit

In addition to my previous message (which was mainly about myself). NHS is a big deal at our even if it is not on a college application. We have won the National Award for community service 2 years in a row and are the only one in Illinois to receive the award (i think, my teacher is the sponsor and it is her club so controls it and it is very hard to get involved [emotionally, you know your heart] because she makes all of the decisions [even the president feels that way]). "If you don't get in there is always next year," is the sympathy I usually get but if that doesn't help it really just depends on the prestige of your society. If it is very selective and wins awards and stuff then it would look better but if not then it is especially no big deal. Just worry about other stuff because if you didn't get in there is nothing you can do so just use that to grow and become a better person. (it is very late in the night and now I am becoming very cheesy. Help!)

By JB on Wednesday, February 19, 2003 - 06:37 am: Edit

For official information concerning the National Honor Society visit www.nhs.us

By Loren on Friday, February 21, 2003 - 04:00 pm: Edit

hey all you guys talk about colleges just skipping over it.. then what do they really look for..lots of people are editors and presidents, etc. so what stands out?

By Kalitiha (Kalitiha) on Friday, March 07, 2003 - 10:17 pm: Edit

National Honor Society is supposed to be an honor. I know a girl that is now going to Grinnell and she wasn't inducted at my school. She was valedictorian and had led our softball team to state several times as the pitcher, as well as working and having other involvements. The college wanted to know why she wasn't in NHS, they thought it reflected poorly on her. The reason she wasn't inducted? Politics. She, and now I, both attend(ed) a gifted and talented school about 30 miles away from the school in our town. We have both had the initiative to go and take AP classes, since our school doesn't even offer honors classes (or anything difficult). There is great resentment about this, and so teachers either abstain from voting or spitefully give a bad rating during the evaluation process.

At my school, the most important factor for admission is sports involvement. Scholarship is established by a GPA of 3.25, easy since no class is difficult. If you meet the GPA requirement, you can apply. Then, you write an essay, which I had to go to the school board to get raised to 250 words. Can you imagine? 250 words is barely a paragraph, I suggested that be the minimum, but most of my darling classmates could barely manage that as the maximum. So, you write an essay about why you deserve to be in NHS and then fill out a list of activities, service, and leadership positions. Then, the teachers evaluate your application and give you a rating from 1-4. 4 is the highest and a 3 average in all 3 categories is needed for admittance. And teachers don't have to justify their ratings unless they give a 1, or they can abstain if they don't feel they know the applicant, or don't want to vote for them.

So, given that the teachers have no accountability, that all of them are coaches (you have to be willing to coach something to be hired at my school), and that there is a huge turnover rate of teachers every year, plus add the resentment for "betraying your school" and voila! the best students in school are denied entrance to NHS. I'm not in--I ran out of space on my school's precious application, and have already accumulated more honors and awards than the rest of my class combined. I haven't played a sport since 10th grade, but I've been active in yearbook, speech, play, and about 10 other activities outside of my school including work and extensive volunteering---however, none of this matters to the pricks in my school. Last year's valedictorian wasn't admitted, he stayed at home, didn't try to take AP classes, but he wasn't an athlete. Almost every student that has ever truly represented the ideals that are supposed to be embodied in NHS has been denied entrance at my school.

NHS is a sham and a mockery at my school. The admittance policies are discriminatory and biased. Most of the members represent none of the virtues of NHS, but sure can handle a ball! For these reasons, I'm having my school's NHS charter investigated and hopefully revoked by NHS headquarters. If my school can't uphold the principles of NHS, and denigrates them too, then they have no right to an institution based on honor......and they have none themselves.

By Autodidact (Autodidact) on Saturday, March 08, 2003 - 11:48 am: Edit

Kali:
You only forgot a couple of salient facts--I know it's been a few years and the facts get blurry with time-- the Grinnell student lead them (carried them) to state for the first time in our school's history, but that was after the selection meeting. (There was no application at that time--it took us two years to get one to hopefully preclude it happening again--unfortunately,not so, for the reasons you sighted.)
Last years val. (as well as you) was also a NMFinalist, but the faculty doesn't evidently attach any importance to that accomplishment. Nor does it reward dedication to the fine arts, the boy had been very active in band and drama productions, and was a fine writer, but we have no school paper to publicize this skill. Evidently, they didn't value his continued communitiy service, k-12, to the PTA or his local part time job which paid less than his classmates were willing to accept and had no prestige or employee discounts attached to it, but provided a necessary and valuable service to our community.
You all got shafted without getting kissed, so did several others along the way, locally and nationally, it would seem.
Once inducted, an NHS member remains so, unless they commit a grievous error, or drop below each individual schools' self-determined gpa requirement-our school didn't adopt or add that provision.
In the sake of fairness, not ALL of our teachers are coaches, just Most All of them, but the rest bears entirely and completely true. I'm certain there are a couple of honest individuals --okay, at least one--who realize the system is bogus, "but don't know all of the facts, and don't want to know all of the facts."
Perhaps if all of the students who think the system has become too politicized to be beneficial would email the National Headquarters, they would realize that they need uniform requirements and evaluative criterion to claim it as a National Honor Society, or that it is time to disband.
For the record, I was inducted as a member at the first opportunity, and it did mean something in my school, but any service done was strictly the student's own initiative, not a "let's all get together and do this one hour, one day," etc. that I see becoming commonplace, where some of the members are conveniently sick or absent, and yet the local paper writes it up the NHS participated.
I fully support Kali's efforts to seek revocation--and any other student's efforts who recognizes that their chapter has been corrupted and turned into an exclusionary, punitive tool by people who are acting unethically, in a non-professional and dishonorable fashion.
I'm also curious to see how many of the faculty who are making these decisions were deemed worthy of the honor when they were in high school and what they do with their free time.

By Congocross (Congocross) on Thursday, March 13, 2003 - 11:38 pm: Edit

National Honors Society is worthless, nowadays almost every applicants have it. Many of students in my school does not even bother with it because we have to do over 25 hours of CS per trimester. With the academics, we just do not have the time.

By Incognito (Incognito) on Friday, March 14, 2003 - 01:19 pm: Edit

NHS is BS, no offense...

By Randy80016 (Randy80016) on Saturday, March 15, 2003 - 01:24 am: Edit

"National Merit Finalist isn't what it used to be"

Actually this is done by percentage- so unless the percentage (Top .7% of PSAT scores I think) has increased, then this award is EXACTLY what it used to be. But I agree, it really doesn't mean much to an Ivy Leauge caliber school, whose average SAT scores are 1400+, since most people with those type of scores to begin with were the ones who where NM Finalists- but its always been like this.

By John (John) on Saturday, March 15, 2003 - 02:33 pm: Edit

My school is one of the top public high schools in MA. Out of like 210 kids in my class, about 100 were accepted to NHS. It was based solely on GPA, and everyone who was nominated got in. There are multiple offices, President, VP, treasurer, secretary. Only people that do anything is president and VP. They participate in the induction for the next years class, and I think the president has a speech at graduation. There are never any meetings. The only distinction between people in NHS and not in it, is that people in NHS are required to tutor underclassmen.

By Annami (Annami) on Tuesday, April 01, 2003 - 10:50 pm: Edit

encvotoo0t!T
Lege she applied to wrote to her asking why she wasn't in itf
is bedon't know. Just a personal experience, but watch out with the NHS!

By Intergamer (Intergamer) on Sunday, June 01, 2003 - 08:45 pm: Edit

We induct around 125 kids a year (about half the class). And our admissions process is based on how many awards and extra curricular activies we put down on our form (no matter what they are - they just counts them up). Even if they are all really the same thing (like participation in 10 different tennis tournaments, put down separately).

By Piratekitty (Piratekitty) on Thursday, October 23, 2003 - 12:12 am: Edit

i was told by my school counsolor that college admissions people look for that on your application; my counsolor used to be an admissions director for a local college

By Starberri_Pie2 (Starberri_Pie2) on Friday, November 28, 2003 - 07:38 am: Edit

Generally, admissions people and certain scholarships specifically ask you not to include awards such as national honor society, national honor roll, and who's who's. I go to a private school in pasadena, california, and when college counselors come from ucla or stanford they usually tell you that there is only a limited amount of space to mention awards and that the space should be used for honors that reveal more about your degree of achievement. Therfore, awards don't have such a good reputation for how it awards students shouldn't be awarded. They'd rather you list 2 awards that meant a lot to you than a laundry list of mediocre ones everybody else gets. But don't get me wrong b/c i've also gotten these awards but i never got to use them on my application b/c there were others that were more important to me.