August 28, 2004

• Generally speaking, the more exclusive the group the more cachet for employers or grad schools. I wouldn't bother with the Golden Key for that reason, though I don't have any experience with them. You may want to check out what else is out there though. I'm pretty sure I have my current job partly because I'm a PBK, based on how often my boss mentions it when introducing me.
• If you join an honor (sic) society, you can become president of the whole free world. What a reason to part with your $80!
• About 60 people in my graduating law class got Golden Key invitations, and 2 of them (that I know of) signed up. They tell me it was a waste of the $80. On the other hand, I was once hired because the partner had really romantic ideas about where I was from (he thinks the entire place is Martha's Vineyard without all the annoying leaf-peepers, and he's wrong but hey, I wasn't going to say anything). Upshot: if your prospective employer is GK, it helps, if not, the Dean's List is something *everyone* recognises.
• Alpha Gamma Sigma here. I don't know how much pull it has in the US, but in NZ it's unusual enough to get extra attention in a curriculum vitae or job interview.
• My brother once signed up for Golden Key, amid promises that they'd send him all sorts of goodies like invitations to meetings and prospective activities and so-forth. The only things he ever received from them after that were more invitations to join Golden Key.
• Grad schools wouldn't care a whit about this sort of thing. They want basically good marks, a good personal essay/writing sample, and (most especially) recommendations from academics, preferrably ones whose work they recognise (Though it would surprise you how many other professors recognise your professor, when in the same field). Everything else is just icing on the cake. I would second Dreadnought's warning - Golden Key seems a scam. I also think Dean's list and scholarships can trump any honor societies on a CV/resume - you can always throw on little definitions (like noting that only 5% are on the Dean's list at your university). Or at least they should, considering they are the pre-requisites to joining any honor society. Cali - what is PBK? My memory suggests something Greek, but I don't know the siginificance of it.
• My feeling when offered was that this was a complete waste of money and time. Nothing's changed in the 10 intervening years.
• If I'm reading a resume, and I discover someone's joined an honor society that consists of paying a membership in exchange for their name, picture, and bio in a book (such as the Who's Who in X series), I laugh at them and put their resume at the bottom, only to be considered if everything else was particularly good. If it's something that you join in order to do something, or it's something offered by a school just because (Dean's List), then I notice it vaguely and move on.
• Thanks for the answers. They kind of validate my first impressions. Sounds like the only benefit would be the secret handshake I could give to other members, which I'm not so interested in. Just wanted to make sure they weren't the Stonecutters and miss out on the real emergency number.
• A close friend of mine joined the Golden Key a few years back and suggested I join as well. I never followed up and she never mentioned it again. I kept waiting for glowing reports that never came. I'll have to ask her what came of her membership. Personally, I think your grades and academic accomplishments are more important and speak for themselves on your CV and academic transcript. When I started university I set my self the goal of graduating Summa cum laude. I made it (and put myself in hospital, but that's another story...) and in my day-job years immediately after university I often saw how impressed prospective employers were when they saw that on my CV. I still see that it impresses clients and students if they notice my degree on the wall. This is more important and has an authority that few intellectual societies can match. Scholarships also look great on a CV or a transcript, but I don't see how joining a group such as the Golden Key would make obtaining them that much easier: your marks are obviously good, you are obviously motivated, so finding out about and applying for scholarships shouldn't be hard - there are lots of them both within and without academic institutions. I'd spend the $80 buying a few drinks for people with good reputations you think can write you excellent letters of reference. A strong reference is worth it's weight in gold.
• I think it was gold key that sent me a letter to join. I didn't bother. Call my cynical but any organization that sends me a letter out of the blue telling me all the great things they will do for me if only I send them some money is a scam. Anything that is really worthwile will contact you in person, usually through a friend or an aquaintance and money won't be the main issue.
• I joined Golden Key while a naive undergrad. In the intervening years they have supplied me with endless opportunities...to apply for Golden Key credit cards and to buy all manner of Golden Key logo junk. Ah well, we live and learn. Save your money.
• Honor societies whose members are nominated by the college or university faculty to honor superior performance, like Phi Beta Kappa or Beta Gamma Sigma, can give you a few bonus points on a resume. And you don't have to pay to be a member.
• I think path has the answer - good honour societies don't ask you to pay to join.
• Thats Doctor Peggy Hill to you!!
• They look really nice in the graduation booklet. Other than that, I don't know that they help at all, and that's coming from someone who was in three or four of them in college (Including Golden Key which I don't remember paying anything for, but in any case all I've ever gotten from them is credit card offers). No one really cares in business or when you apply to grad school. They're more interested in recommendations and performance history.
• I am an academic, and the only honor societies that would count in a job search or evaluating potential grad students are the discipline-specific ones--for history that would be Phi Alpha Theta, and only then if you had some kind of leadership role. Dean's List, graduating with honors, etc. are good too. Membership in Golden Key, or a "Who's Who" listing, would just convince me that the applicant is a clueless tool.
• They invited me to "join" too, so I guess they'll take anyone coz I'm fucking stupid.
• my approach would be similar to sandspider's. if you bother mentioning on your resume/cv that you're a member of some elitist (pay to join or not) society, i'll put your details on the bottom of the pile. if your grades are very good, i'll move your resume/cv back up.
• But roryk, if I put in a mention that I was a member of a non-elitist society like the Columbia Record Guild, would you keep me at the top of the pile since I'm such a woman of the people? I am a member of the US business honor society. I didn't ask to join, I was nominated by the business school faculty. It was not a big a deal as graduating summa cum laude, but it was kind of like a really good performance review - an opinion from somebody besides myself that I excelled at something or other, like, maybe, learning to use logic, or understanding some applicable business concepts that not everyone got. Especially for folks who just graduated without much practical experience, that sort of validation can be important. And, at least the honors society of which I'm a life member, with no further effort on my part, is not "elitist" in the sense that of having luxurious club facilities which require a secret handshake to enter. I got a tiny gold charm (kind of like a PBK key) and an annual newsletter, which I don't read. And, I lost the charm almost immediately.
• If you do join the Golden Key, rush out immediately after and join MENSA, buy your way into a few Who's Who books (Who's Who in dumbassery, Who's Who on the internet, Who's Who with ten fingers...) and have your ghost-written autobiography published by a vanity press. Then, disappear into a cloud of vapour due to extreme metaphysical implausibility.