History and Significance of the Phi Beta Kappa Society

For over two hundred years election to Phi Beta Kappa has been a recognition of intellectual capacities well employed, especially in the acquiring of an education in the liberal arts and sciences. The objectives of humane learning encouraged by Phi Beta Kappa include intellectual honesty and tolerance, range of intellectual interests, and understanding-not merely knowledge. Newman's conviction that "the test of education lies not in what a man knows but in what he is" gets at the heart of the matter. The quickening not only of mind, but also of spirit, is the aim of a liberal arts education. As men and women are devoted to intellectual pursuits, we have a happy faith that in the future, as in the past, the liberal arts and sciences will continue to be central to any meaningful understanding of the human condition. Phi Beta Kappa is the symbol of such a faith.

The Phi Beta Kappa Society was organized at William and Mary College in 1776. Though originally a Greek letter fraternity, it has long since changed its character and is not now in any sense a college secret fraternity or undergraduate organization. The chief function of the local chapters of the society is to confer distinction upon the graduates of the colleges who merit it by the superiority of their scholastic attainments and services. The honor of election to this society at graduation or later has long been a reward highly prized and earnestly striven for by students at graduation of many of the foremost colleges of this country. Chapters were established at Harvard and Yale in 1780. Since that date 242 of the leading American colleges have been admitted to the Phi Beta Kappa list of approved institutions. Now there are more than 400 thousand members of the society, including many of the most prominent people of the nation, who proudly wear the well known key, the emblem of scholarship.

The Alpha of West Virginia was granted a charter by the Tenth National Council on September 14, 1910. The chapter was organized on December 5, 1910.