<p>I'm not sure about how NHS works at other schools, but at my high school, it's close to useless. We have one 5 minute meeting every month, and absolutely nothing is accomplished during that time. There are fundraisers, but those are entirely carried out by the teacher in charge of NHS, and it's pretty difficult for any of the students to get involved. I was a treasurer last year, but the most work I ever did was reading off a pre-typed 2 minute speech at the induction ceremony. Some people say that NHS is one of those activities that you should put on the common app no matter what (especially if you are an officer), because it's pretty much a given. Is it even worth it though? I feel like it would just take up space unnecessarily.</p>
<p>How important is NHS at your school? Are you involved with your community, or is it just one of those easy "award"-type things that you are inducted into and never hear from again?</p>
<p>It’s not a given, because I got rejected from it even though I’m awesome and go to a really low-achieving high school.
It’s not important, especially with only ten spaces. If anyone put NHS I would immediately assume it was because they had nothing better. A college isn’t going to penalize you for not conforming enough with your ECs.</p>
<p>At my school it’s a huge popularity contest, since the committee is heavily influenced by students already in the society. And what they do isn’t particularly interesting anyways, since at my school there are subject specific honor societies.</p>
<p>I know how you feel. Every single club at my school is like that. In reality, most people go to the club for a cool cord at graduation. Whenever there are meetings, it’s usually to talk about what our money has done, not what we have done.</p>
<p>Our NHS chapter is rather different than all of yours. We have a set list volunteering oriented activities that we have to complete in order to be remain a member. And since I’m president of our chapter, I think that it would be important to include on my application.</p>
<p>At my school, NHS becomes a big deal in the spring of sophomore year when everyone’s rushing to apply, but after that no one really cares. We have 5 hours of mandatory service per semester, which isn’t that much, and a lot of people fill those hour by lounging around the school during parent teacher conferences to “provide directions” to parents.</p>
<p>So yeah, I’d say if you like it or really want to be in it, then do it. If you think it’s useless, there are other ways to do community service or volunteering or whatever you’re into. And it’s definitely not necessary for your application. Most of my friends who got into top tier universities weren’t in NHS (a lot of them didn’t even bother to apply because they weren’t impressed by what it does).</p>
<p>It’s a big deal at my school, but you have some people who just do it because their friends are doing it. Community service is or going to be our top priority. As secretary and treasurer of the chapter, one of my goals is to increase the amount of participation of the members. The NHS and SGA were offered to help out with freshmen orientation; we had a very good turnout, but I wished a little more members helped. To be honest, in my chapter, you can’t get lazy, you need to have the drive to help other people. We require 12 hours of service each year. Four hours must pertain to tutoring within the school and two hours must pertain to sponsored activities.</p>
<p>Sure many people I know weren’t in national honors society and went to great schools, but In my opinion the people that should be in it, should be individuals who truly enjoy helping the people around them.</p>
<p>It is actually really important at our school. The teacher who runs the club requires the governing committee to run 70% of the club. In addition, in order to stay in the club we need 100 hours of volunteer service by the end of the junior year and 120 hours by the end of senior year.</p>
<p>We do NOTHING in NHS at my school. It’s such a common EC that I wouldn’t even bother listing it on the Common App if you have other stuff that could fill the space.</p>
<p>NHS serves entirely as a resume polisher for our students, and inflates student’s ego when they are accepted. I am a top student and I realized it’s meaningless, therefore I didn’t join, who cares, I already have leadership positions in 4 other clubs next year that are more meaningful than NHS. I’m a little worried it would look odd that I wasn’t in it, but I think only one or two other students will apply to the same schools as me.</p>
<p>At my school, anyone who has above a 3.5 (weighted) GPA is eligible to join National Honor Society. Once you get an invitation, all you do is pay a $5 fee to become a member. We don’t even have a required number of hours of community service haha. I was treasurer last year, but only because half of the members ditched the nomination day and I ran unopposed. I don’t think I’m going to put it on my common app</p>
<p>Can colleges tell if your NHS is active/prestigious or not?</p>
<p>NHS at our school is probably the hardest thing to get into. We have to submit applications listing our activities, volunteer hours, and a short essay. And then we have random interviews. When acceptances come out, there’s always a slew of facebook updates celebrating how someone got in or complaining about how someone got rejected. We’re also very active. This year we helped renovate the school, held a few fundraisers, and we’re responsible for all the tutoring.
NHS is actually a huge dedication to time, and I don’t want admissions to think that it’s just some certificate club.</p>
<p>In the common app, there is a section called activities. If you do decide to list National Honor Society as one of your ECs, you also have to mention the weeks per year/hours per week that you dedicate to it. I only have 9 meetings a year, and each meeting lasts for only 5 minutes, so for me, NHS may not seem like a great accomplishment. If you participate in fundraisers and dedicate a large portion of your time solely to NHS, that will reflect on the common app.</p>
<p>NHS at my school isn’t too big of a deal. We do have to get at least 5 “points” per semester to remain in the club, but that’s just accomplished by doing some of the volunteering activities that the club infrequently doles out.
Leadership positions are determined by peer election.
We have maybe three meetings a semester, each one lasting ~30 min.
Not huge.</p>
