Mason's Golden Key honor society revived, wins awards at annual summit

Mason's chapter, from left to right; Katie Beck, Lois Petersen, Dean Fox, Blake Silver, Nader Hussein, and Sam Dudding. 
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This past July, George Mason University’s chapter of the Golden Key International Honour Society was given three separate awards at their annual conference in Scottsdale, Arizona.
 
Having been out of action for some time, the Golden Key, an elite honor society that offers membership to only the top 15 percent of sophomores, juniors and seniors, came back with a vengeance this year with the help of faculty adviser Associate Dean for the Office of Academic Integrity Donna Fox, according to their President Nader Hussein.

“The Mason chapter of Golden Key had been dormant for approximately three years before Dean Fox, myself, and 5 other officers decided to revive our chapter. In just one year, we were able to go from the lowest standard to ‘Gold Standing,’ the highest standard achievable.” said Hussein.

Hussein cited Fox’s energy, caring personality, and professionalism as leading reasons as to why the group was able to prosper this year.

Specific members of the Golden Key also received awards for their work within the group. Due to the large number of individual chapters at the conference, chapters were separated into regions. Mason’s chapter was listed as Region 2 and included other chapters in Virginia, Tennessee, North Carolina and South Carolina, according to Hussein.

Blake Silver, the chapter’s vice president was awarded the 2010 Regional Student Leader Award while Dean Fox was given the 2010 Faculty Adviser of the Year Award, said Hussein.

“Only one student and one faculty advisor from each region gets recognized each year with these awards, and this year, George Mason University received both,” said Hussein.

With these individual awards came a monetary prize of $1000.

Hussein, Silver and historian Katie Beck, all students, also presented a seminar at the Golden Key International Summit called “CPR: A Guide to Chapter Revival,” in which they discussed student involvement and the reviving of university chapters, according to Hussein. Their presentation, one out of 50, was ranked as the fourth best at the conference.

“I believe one of the reasons that it did so well is because there are many chapters that struggle with student engagement. It can be very difficult to draw students into chapter events, let alone organize these events. Since we come from a similar background, it was easy for us to connect with many of the other chapters,” said Hussein.

The Golden Key is recognized as one of the largest honor societies in the world with over 1.7 million members in 150 different countries. The group lists Integrity, Collaboration, Innovation, Respect, Diversity, Excellence and Engagement as their top values, according to the organization's website.