You are right, ucbalumnus, that a holistic selection would be far worse and would definitely result in NHS becoming a contest of popularity of the applicants among the teachers and staff. However, the alternative is not necessarily to have ridiculous pre-set criteria. They could just establish reasonable criteria that respects student autonomy and individuality. If a student has served both school and community with commitment, as evidenced by a required total number of hours, I see no reason to add more regulations as to the exact distribution of those hours. As it is at our school, they will not accept more than 40 hours at any one site, and they require a minimum number of sites. What is the purpose of that?