Pi Sigma Alpha Well-Represented at

2010 ACHS Meeting

by Nancy McManus, Administrator

Pi Sigma Alpha National Office

The Association of College Honor Societies (ACHS) met in Boston, MA February 18 – 21, 2010, with representatives from most of the 66 member societies attending. Nancy McManus, Pi Sigma Alpha Administrator and a member of the ACHS Board of Directors, represented Pi Sigma Alpha at the meeting. The meeting included sessions on practical aspects of honor society operations and management as well as thought-provoking sessions addressing this year’s conference theme of “Looking Outside: Honor Societies and Society.”

The ACHS Annual Meeting provides an opportunity for member societies to learn from each other and from outside experts in relevant fields. This year, for instance, member society representatives, drawing on their own experience, gave presentations on using Webinars and social networking media to connect with students, and on establishing honor society chapters in universities outside the U. S. and in online universities. Dr. Nancy Hensel of the Council for Undergraduate Research gave an excellent presentation on supporting undergraduate research, followed by a panel of physics students who described their research experiences. A session on honor societies and social responsibility featured an inspiring talk by Dr. Christopher J. Bosso of Northeastern University (see lead story in this issue), a former president of Pi Sigma Alpha, on the role honor societies can play in developing the sense of civic responsibility necessary to preserve and protect our democratic institutions. McManus reported on ACHS’ highly successful program of chapter advisor grants for projects on the theme of social responsibility. Other sessions dealt with developing an alumni base, benchmarks for chapter effectiveness, creating partnerships with other organizations to strengthen your “mark,” and more. As always, roundtables were organized for small groups interested in topics such as succession planning for honor society directors, the new IRS Form 990, managing online sales, budgeting, and more.

A highlight of the 2010 meeting was the session on honor society governance at which Pi Sigma Alpha’s General Counsel John C. Kuzenski, an attorney specializing in nonprofit academic organizations as well as a political scientist, presented a detailed examination of how the American Bar Association’s newly-revised Model Nonprofit Corporation Act relates to the organization and governance of honor societies. John’s PowerPoint presentation is available in the ACHS web site (www.achsnatl.org) “Knowledge Resources” section, as is his 2009 presentation on the legal issues pertinent to individual honor society chapters. Attendees were also treated to a lively lunch talk by Kenneth Elmore, Dean of Students at Boston University, and an after-dinner talk on the appalling high school dropout rate by Elaine Leibsohn of America’s Promise Alliance.

The Association formally adopted the theme of “Social Responsibility” for a three-year initiative. Pi Sigma Alpha will participate in that effort by favoring the theme in its Chapter Activity Grants competition in 2010. ACHS was founded in 1925. Its mission is “to build a visibly cohesive community of national and international honor societies, individually and collaboratively exhibiting excellence in scholarship, service, programs, and governance.” Pi Sigma Alpha has been a member of ACHS since 1948, and fully complies with all its standards.