About Key Club

What is Key Club?

Key Club is the oldest and largest service program for high school students. What makes Key Club so successful is the fact that it is a student-led organization that teaches leadership through serving others. Members of the Kiwanis International family, Key Club members build themselves as they build their schools and communities.

Today, Key Club exists on more than 5,000 high school campuses, primarily in the United States and Canada. Growth efforts, however, have taken the Key Club experience internationally to Canada, the Caribbean nations, Central and South America, and most recently to Asia and Australia.

Key Club International is an organization of individual Key Clubs and is funded by nominal dues paid by every member. Its officers are high school leaders elected by the members at district and International conventions. The organization offers a wide range of opportunities to its members:

• Leadership development
• Vocational guidance
• College scholarships
• Subscription to the KEYNOTER magazine
• Service-learning
• Personal enrichment
• Value-added member benefit programs

History

It was in May 1925 in Sacramento, California, that the eleven charter members comprising the first Key Club met officially for the first time. Prior to that meeting came a full year's activity and thought, through which the idea of the Key Club developed and finally reached fruition.

Two men in the Sacramento Kiwanis club, who were high school administrators, approached their club with the idea of a junior service club in the high school, to be patterned after Kiwanis and to have its own classifications based on school interests and to hold luncheon meetings. Through this group in the high school, the Kiwanis club hoped to provide vocational guidance, first to boys who had decided upon their future occupation, and then to the entire school. The Kiwanis club president liked the plan and appointed a committee to look into the matter. The principal of the high school was most receptive and assisted in finding boys interested in joining such a group. Next, the plan was presented to the Board of Education upon the principal's request, and following its approval, the first Key Club meeting was held early in May 1925. Evidence of the value of this group and its program is found in the fact that the Sacramento High School Key Club is still in flourishing existence today.

The club held weekly luncheons in the school, where Kiwanians came to speak to the group on various vocations. Key Club members attended Kiwanis meetings as guests of the club to enhance further the value of Key Club membership by bringing high school students into constant contact with the business and professional men of the community. As the experience of the Key Club grew, a noticeable trend toward expanding the original purpose and activity was found possible, and the club was soon a complete service organization for the whole school. It also offered a social program to balance its service activities.

Key Club is truly an "International" organization. In 1946 the first club was built in Canada, and since that time many more have been added. Key Clubs have also been formed in the Caribbean and future growth is promising. Every year, led by the international officers, two hundred or more new Key Clubs are added to this fast growing organization, but emphasis is on permanent, active clubs, rather than on mere numbers as such. With this criterion as a guide, Key Clubs can expect a steady, healthy growth for many years to come.

Mission Statement

"Key Club is an international student-led organization which provides its members with opportunities to provide service, build character and develop leadership."

The core values of Key Club International are leadership, character building, caring, and inclusiveness.

• To develop initiative and leadership.
• To provide experience in living and working together.
• To serve the school and community.
• To cooperate with the school principal.
• To prepare for useful citizenship.
• To accept and promote the following ideals:
• To give primacy to the human and spiritual, rather than to the  material values of life.
• To encourage the daily living of the Golden Rule in all human relationships.
• To promote the adoption and application of higher standards in scholarship, sportsmanship, and social contacts.
• To develop, by precept and example, a more intelligent, aggressive, and serviceable citizenship.
• To provide a practical means to form enduring friendships, to render unselfish service, and to build better communities.
• To cooperate in creating and maintaining that sound public opinion and high idealism which makes possible the increase of righteousness, justice, patriotism, and good will.