Honor Societies

[willthatsall]

For those of you applying for med school or have already gotten accepted, how do you feel about honor societies on your application? I have gotten invitations to a few of them (I think one is called Phi Kappa Phi, not sure about the others) and they always say something like "this is a great opportunity, blah blah blah, you only pay $50, blah blah blah" and so forth. Do you feel like honor societies are worthwhile things to get into? The only reason I would be interested is in order to make my application look better, but it just seems like a silly way to spend money to me. Because what does an honor society prove? That you have good grades. But if you already have to put your GPA on the application, being in an honor society doesn't really tell them anything they don't already know, does it? Anyone have any ideas about that?

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[39094]

Pretty much the only one that gets any respect out there is Phi Beta Kappa, the rest are just out to steal your money. You can join as many as you want, but it really doesn't mean a whole heck of a lot and adcoms are not going to be impressed by the number of greek letters in your AMCAS.

Phi Beta Kappa gets some respect because of its exculsivity (top 3% at any given university), but it's once again just a nice thing to tag onto your CV, doesn't count for a whole lot I would think.

That's my 2 cents anyway, maybe other people feel differently.

 

[TheFlash]

I've gotten the impression that most of these "honor societies" are just out to get your money. They're a total rip-off. Since most of them are pretty inclusive, they're not particulary good resume builders either, unless you take a leadership role in any of them.

Wait till your junior or senior year and join Phi Beta Kappa. That is, of course, if they invite you.

 

[bewitched1081]

yeah, goldenkey is a total rip off unless youre planning to get really involved in their activities. it's funny cause my dad was so proud when i joined that he framed my certificate and hung it next to my sis's b.a. then when i got into PBK he just put the certificate in his file drawer. hahahahaha.

 

[noy]

If you are an engineer, Tau Beta Pi is very well known within the community, equivalent to Phi Beta Kappa in the humanities world. Very worth your time and money.