National Society of High School Scholars?

Applying to College
1

<p>I got an invitation in the mail for the National Society of High school Scholars. Is that a prestigious organization or something?</p>

2

<p>Meh. Its not prestigious. They basically ask everyone for a membership fee and use that money to give out scholarships to a select few. There is a lot of debate on the topic, but essentially, groups like NSHSS are businesses that start with unethical motives (profiting of students) but a wonderfully beneficial front. </p>

<p>Overall, it’s not something worth joining, but feel free to send in your membership fee. The only requirement to join is a 3,5GPA and some money, so as you can imagine, putting it on your resume isn’t impressive at all. Plus, there are stories of parents with kids who are epic failures (see: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1064587984-post82.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1064587984-post82.html&lt;/a&gt;) who were still invited, clearly below this so-called requirment. </p>

<p>However, if you win one of their scholarships, that might be worth mentioning on your resume and obviously covers that app fee. Rare though, given the numbers and the competition.</p>

<p>Some info:
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/39022-national-society-high-school-scholars.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/39022-national-society-high-school-scholars.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

3

<p>It currently has something crazy like 550,000 members (or so they say). I believe that’s total admitted students, not just current ones. At $60 a pop for membership fees, they’ve pulled in 33 million. Every year (since 2002), they’ve given out about 140k in scholarships, so 1.5million total. Wheres the other 31.5million? Who knows. Sure, the hold meetings and have some employees, but c’mon, there’s something a little fishy in those numbers.</p>

4

<p>Ehh, not really. The longer I stay out of it, the more they send these letters to me. I’ve gotten 2 or 3 of these same invitations already.</p>

5

<p>save your 60 bucks for an application fee. seriously, do you think a college will be impressed because you have a gpa of 3.5, have $60 to spare, and answer junk mail? save it, even if its not for a college app, use it on a nice pair of shoes or jeans or something…anyway NOT prestigious</p>

6

<p>My junior dd just got this invite today. If it really is a scam it ticks me off because they mention in a P.S. that a favorite teacher from DD’s high school was also honored with an Educator Distinction award. This would really hook dd and her friends in. She has a 4.0 unweighted so we really thought it was something prestigious.</p>