Students at UC Irvine constantly receive emails and letters from numerous self-proclaimed honors societies. Perhaps the most prominent and easily recognized by students is an organization called the National Society of Leadership and Success (NSLS).
According to its website, the NSLS is a national leadership honor society that promises students a variety of academic, professional and even monetary benefits at the cost of a “one-time registration fee of $95.”
With 751 chapters, the NSLS currently has 1.7 million members across the U.S., and describes itself as “an organization that provides a life-changing leadership program that helps students achieve personal growth, career success, and empowers them to have a positive impact in their communities.” The NSLS reports that its UCI chapter has 7,765 current members and 4,253 alumni at the time of this writing.
There has been skepticism both offline and online regarding the credibility of the NSLS as a national honor society.
Online, users of UCI’s Reddit community have questioned the value and legitimacy of the NSLS going back as far as 2014. Additionally, over 180 similar posts have been made across various universities’ Reddit communities in past years.
Recent emails from the NSLS state that a nomination to join the society is a “prestigious honor” and one that is “awarded to only a small percent of University of California, Irvine students.” It also states that the recipient has been “recognized as an exemplary student exceeding the criteria for membership in the National Society of Leadership and Success.”
This article will attempt to provide answers to some of the questions about the NSLS that have been asked by Anteaters and university students nationwide.
What exactly does the NSLS offer students?
According to the NSLS website, benefits for NSLS members include access to scholarships, letters of recommendation and interview prep, live-streamed online speaker series, “professional success coaches,” discounts at major retailers and businesses and a leadership training program that involves participating “with NSLS peers in goal setting, accountability, and commitment to action.”
There is also a “membership kit” that consists of a certificate, t-shirt, sticker, pin and a plaque at an additional fee. The kit is shipped to members who complete a four-step induction process that involves an in-person or online orientation, a two-hour interactive video, three online celebrity/professional speaker broadcasts and three “peer coaching” meetings.
Local membership events and activities are in part coordinated by each school’s respective chapter. The New University has reached out to NSLS’s UCI chapter to ascertain what these benefits actually entail for Anteaters who decide to join, but has yet to receive a response.
What does it take to join the NSLS?
Aside from the $95 registration fee, specific criteria for membership is not stated by the NSLS, with their website FAQ section stating that “nomination criteria is determined by local Chapter Leaders and is based on GPA and/or leadership potential.” This is in stark contrast to other honor societies like the well-known and prestigious Phi Beta Kappa, America’s oldest academic honor society, which has a clear list of membership requirements on its website.
The New University has reached out to NSLS’s UCI chapter leaders to ascertain their specific membership criteria but has yet to receive a response.
Is the NSLS accredited?
The NSLS is accredited by Cognia, a nonprofit that accredits 36,000 primary and secondary public and private schools in over 90 countries. Out of the 36,000 schools, 30,000 are located in the United States. Cognia is headed by CEO Mark Elgart, who was compensated $924,850 in 2019, according to the nonprofit’s 2020 Internal Revenue Service filing.
The NSLS is not, however, recognized by the Association of College and Honor Societies (ACHS) as an accredited honor society. Founded in 1925, the ACHS is the only certifying agency for college and university honor societies within the United States and takes into account the program goals, services, structure, framework; access, equity, diversity, inclusion; and financial disclosure of university honors societies.
The ACHS standards handbook includes a contextual statement, part of which reads “a plethora of internet societies, for-profit societies, and an increasingly narrow set of other specialized societies give rise to the need for the CAS standards to guide colleges and universities in setting regulations for official recognition of campus honor societies.” The ACHS only provides accreditation to honor societies that are charitable and not-for-profit.
What kind of organization is the NSLS?
The NSLS refers to itself as a “for benefit” organization and is headed by Neil Khaund, a CEO with years of experience leading corporate development of education firms and college prep franchises. While it claims to be aligned in the interests of improving students’ future job potential and academic performance, it is a for-profit business and is not tax-exempt like nonprofit organizations are.
The New University spoke to corporate attorney Christina Gordon to gain a better understanding of what a for-benefit organization is from a legal perspective.
“I haven’t dealt with a lot of for-benefit companies but based off what I’m seeing online, they (the NSLS) would not be tax exempt and would be taxed like a for-profit corporation. Tax exempt status is only available for nonprofits,” said Gordon. She added that “for-benefit corps appear to have owners that will receive a dividend of proceeds whereas nonprofits must use any proceeds for a charitable purpose.”
The NSLS partners with businesses like Geico, Hello Fresh, Firestone, Adobe, Dell and AMC, among hundreds of other large corporations, which they advertise by offering discounts to members. The partnerships section of the NSLS website provides marketing statistics like membership demographics, social media engagement and email marketing engagement.
It also mentions that partners have the opportunity to “increase brand awareness and brand loyalty with access to new members every single year, with opportunities for niche audience segmentation,” and to “boost your web traffic and convert subscribers for your brand year after year with an efficient and consistent reach to our members, both traditional and nontraditional students.”
What about the fine print?
Examining the terms and conditions portion of their website reveals a few pertinent details. For one, the limitation on liability section states that the NSLS will not be held liable for a list of potential malfeasances, including “the use or performance of, the delay in providing, the failure to provide, or the inability to use the site or the services, or any information, software, products or services contained in or available through the site.” “use or performance of” and “failure to provide” the “site or the services, or any information, software, products, or services contained in or available through the site.”
This means that even following payment of the $95 registration fee, members cannot hold NSLS accountable for a failure to deliver promised or implied services within the website. This includes things like web-based academic, professional, monetary benefits and other tools that the NSLS promises its members. NSLS also reserves the right to change services and benefits provided to members without notice.
Another item mentioned in the NSLS’s terms and conditions is advertising retargeting. The NSLS is partnered with AdRoll, a digital marketing platform that specializes in retargeting. AdRoll’s Retargeting methods utilize artificial intelligence to maximize the probability of sales for its customers, based on visitors browsing history and other online behaviors. This includes targeting past visitors of merchant websites with advertisements and refilling their carts as they had them, even if they visited a merchant’s site over a month prior.
The NSLS states that this allows them to “present [visitors to their website and members] with retargeting advertising on other sites based on your previous interaction with www.nsls.org,” enabling the NSLS to target online visitors and members with ads meant to bring them back to their website.
Below the section concerning retargeting is a section that states “the Company will not be held liable for any damages which may result from the breach of those third parties’ privacy practices.” This ensures that site visitors and members of the NSLS cannot legally hold the NSLS responsible if the data gathered on the NSLS website for the purposes of retargeting is somehow leaked by their advertising partners.
What do members have to say about the NSLS?
Despite the NSLS website providing a membership count of 7,765 at UC Irvine alone, the New University has yet to receive a response from its UCI chapter leadership or receive contact from any current members.
In a query made by the New University on the UCI subreddit, /u/Katxlalala who claims to be a 2022 UCI alumnus, responded that they were in NSLS during community college (CC), but that “at UCI it wasn’t really good.”
“I reached out to [UCI’s NSLS chapter] and then they tried to enroll me again. It’s a lifetime enrollment and I’m already in it dumb*sses. It was great at CC though,” they said.
When asked about what had made their experience with the NSLS at UCI bad in comparison to at community college, /u/Katxlalala responded by saying that there was “no communication, no events, they really didn’t do anything at UCI.”
Another user, /u/Shocksterr, who was not affiliated with the UCI chapter, initially responded to the query, saying “I was on board at my community college for 21-22 during the establishment of the chapter. Despite my title I worked essentially like a co-president.”
/u/Shocksterr — who later introduced himself as UCI third-year business administration major Pardhuman Singh — agreed to speak with the New University about his past experience as NSLS chapter treasurer and board member at Irvine Valley College (IVC).
Singh said that for him, the experience at IVC’s NSLS chapter was beneficial.
“It was like my stepping stone for getting more leadership abilities, and throughout community college, I ended up [being a board member] at seven different organizations… I worked at my community college and now at UCI I lead teams [and] host meetings.”
As part of a ten-person board of students, Singh and his colleagues coordinated with IVC and the NSLS to hold events, lead motivational group meetings, and manage chapter finances.
The end goal for chapter members is an induction ceremony, where nominees are congratulated for their participation and are officially recognized as NSLS members.
“I remember this one lady. She had a husband and kids and everything. She was really excited to show up to the induction ceremony, she brought her parents, her kids, and she took photos and she wanted to nominate someone to join the chapter,” Singh said. “And so I [just thought], wow, she really really got her money’s worth out of it if that’s what she cared about. But I think overall, the experience was very positive. She wanted to showcase that to her family, her friends and just anyone at her community college.”
While the chapter had a positive impact on some of its members, Singh also expressed his initial surprise at the costs of running the program.
“For NSLS to have a chapter on campus, you have to pay a chapter fee [to the NSLS]… If you’re not being an active chapter and doing stuff it’s very hard [to pay that chapter fee] … when I first saw the chapter fees, I was low key surprised too, I was like what the f**k?”
Singh said that after looking into it more, “the way you pay your chapter fee is just basically doing the program like they told you to — completing everything. It just pays for it, and then you don’t have to worry about it.”
According to Singh, chapter fees range from between $1600-$2400 annually. Of each signup and subsequent $95 payment to NSLS, chapters receive a $5 “NSLS credit” from the company. If students complete the program by reaching the induction ceremony, then the chapter receives another $5 credit. These credits can then be used towards paying chapter fees.
“So you just build up credits, and then you can use those credits to pay for your chapter fee [for] the next year. But if you’re not hosting meetings, and people are not joining, you can’t really pay that chapter fee. And then your organization is not going to exist anymore,” Singh said.
Aside from finances, timing was another aspect Singh and his colleagues had to consider.
“Because this was an entire [semester’s] worth [of material], I think we were just trying to stretch it out as long as possible. Also, that we [didn’t] want to do everything within the span of one or two months because people tend to be busy. So we’re like okay, we spaced it a little bit more … but I feel like this entire process [leading up to the induction ceremony] could be done within a few weeks, at most.”
While inductees retain their membership status indefinitely, chapter-specific events cease following the induction ceremony. However, members still are able to enjoy other benefits, like applying for scholarships online and receiving discounts at certain major retailers.
At UCI, less costly on-campus organizations also offer benefits of their own. Now an active member of ASUCI, Singh shared some final thoughts on the viability of NSLS for UCI students and his own opinion on the program’s effectiveness.
“I feel like there are other things on campus like ASUCI … you can join that for free and you can get leadership experience, you can work in teams, plan events—you know, social media, graphic design, and get everything from that. So I think at UCI, you don’t need NSLS. But I think at community college where people are just really introverted and they don’t know anyone, it was worth it. I think people don’t mind paying money as long as they get some benefit from it. And I feel like the people that I’ve helped at community college and I talked with—they, none of them really felt like it [the NSLS] was a scam.”
Simon Jeau is a Campus News Staff Writer. He can be reached at sjeau@uci.edu.