For the members of Cardinal Key, the main theme is helping others.

“I’ve always liked helping people,” said senior Alesha Miller, president of the Baker chapter of Cardinal Key.<br/>

Miller was in National Honor Society at her high school and wanted to become more involved on campus. So she applied for membership to Cardinal Key at the end of her sophomore year.

Senior Beth Hopkins, the fundraising chair for the fall semester, shares Miller’s sentiment.

“Being required to do community service is great,” she said “ It gets me helping people, which I enjoy doing.”

Cardinal Key is a national honor society founded in 1932. Originally, Cardinal Key was intended only for women and was called a national honors sorority. After the ruling on Title IX in 1976, however, it was opened to both men and women. There are 20 active chapters of the Cardinal Key across the country.

The local chapter’s annual chili feed, held at the Baker women’s soccer game Tuesday, generated $187 and also received many non-perishable food items. All free will donations were exchanged for chili and cinnamon rolls, and the proceeds went to the Baldwin City Food Pantry, which has been “hurting for donations recently,” Sara Crump, assistant professor of psychology and the Cardinal Key adviser said. Donations of even a penny got something in return.

“When you don’t put a minimum limit on donations, people tend to be pretty generous,” Crump said.

Cardinal Key’s 25 members do community service projects throughout the year. Their main philanthropy is juvenile diabetes. For the spring semester, money used in voting for students’ favorite candidates for King and Queen of Courts will go toward juvenile diabetes research.

“I think juvenile diabetes is a great cause to help,” Miller said.

They are also planning to do a winter holiday charity event, called “Operation Christmas Child.”<br/>

“We might ask some salon classes to get involved,” Crump said.

Their goal is to collect “a shoebox full of toys” and send them to kids overseas.<br/>

To join Cardinal Key, one must be a junior or senior who is active on campus and within the community, and must maintain at least 3.0 GPA.