Professional degrees assert your proficiency for a specific job, like nursing, civil engineering, or primary education. If your major is also the name of a job, it is probably a professional major. Sports therapy, dentistry, business, and teaching are all examples of professional degrees. English, sociology, mathematics, and philosophy are examples of academic degrees because they qualify you for a variety of different types of work. In general, academic majors teach you how to think while professional degrees teach you how to do something specific. For example, someone with an English degree can go on to become a teacher, publisher, writer, doctor, or something else. A student with a nursing degree is really only prepared to be a nurse, though.

Freshmen and sophomores are never invited to join the Phi Beta Kappa Society. You can be invited as a junior if you’re scheduled to graduate ahead of time, though. Usually, 60% of your credit hours must be completed at the school where your chapter is located. In other words, you will not be eligible if you completed your first 2 years of college at another school. If your school has a different set of graduation requirements, the Phi Beta Kappa Society will use whatever 3/4 of your required hours are to determine the eligibility threshold. For example, if your program requires 140 hours, they’ll wait until you’ve completed 105 hours.

if you are returning from a break in your education, don’t worry about classes that you took more than 5 years ago. Phi Beta Kappa won’t include them in their decision to invite you. The GPA requirement refers to an unweighted GPA on a scale from 0-4. Colleges and universities do not typically use a weighted GPA system.

For example, if you’re an English major with a focus on medieval literature, take some advanced creative writing and modern lit classes in addition to your core requirements. Some chapters have additional requirements to take specific classes in other key disciplines. Consult your chapter’s website or visit their on-campus office to find out what the course requirements are.

Remedial courses cannot count towards this requirement. A logic class will count so long as it’s not an abstract course. Boolean or mathematical logic are good options if you don’t want to take a pure math class. Phi Betta Kappa doesn’t list whether this requirement can be a course that fulfills a general education requirement or not, so it’s a good idea to take an extra math class just to be safe.

At most schools, this means passing a 200-level foreign language class. Any foreign language will count towards this requirement so long as your school offers advanced classes in the subject. For example, a 100-level class in Hungarian will not help you meet this requirement if there are no 200-level Hungarian classes.

The requirements surrounding ethics and morality differ from campus to campus. If you go to a socially-conservative school, there may be additional requirements that aren’t mentioned here.

You can be accused of plagiarism if you share your work with a friend and then they copy it as their own. Keep your work private to avoid this problem.

Only 1/8 of a senior class can be invited to join a Phi Beta Kappa chapter. Standing out on campus is the best way to get noticed as a strong candidate. Colleges typically host some kind of club fair where different organizations recruit new members and show students what they’re all about. Attend an extracurricular fair to find a group that suits you.

If you have a choice between an academic and social event, choose the academic one. An on-campus chess tournament is more likely than a football game to have faculty or other Phi Beta Kappa members in attendance.

Phi Beta Kappa chapters rarely have offices on campus, but you should show up and introduce yourself if they do have one!

List your membership on your resume after you graduate and start applying for jobs. It’s a major accomplishment, and you’ll be glad you included it if you’re ever interviewed by an older member!