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Purpose:

To recognize and reward outstanding students of Spanish within an exclusive society devoted to both maintaining academic excellence in Hispanic studies and supporting the Hispanic community and its flourishing culture. 
 

Qualifications (as outlined by the national chapter):

1. Each (candidate) must have completed three years of study of college-level Spanish (eighteen semester credit hours) or the equivalent thereof, including at least three semester hours of a course in Hispanic literature or Hispanic culture and civilization at the junior (third-year) level. A student may be admitted to active membership while still enrolled in the second junior-level course if all other requirements have been met and if the instructor of the course certifies that the student’s work is of “B” or “A” quality.

2. The candidate for active membership must have a minimal grade point average of 3.0 on a 4.0 point scale in all Spanish courses taken. (The candidate MUST have earned grades in completed Spanish courses in order to qualify for membership.)

3. The candidate must rank in the upper 35% of his/her class—sophomore, junior, or senior—and must have completed at least three semesters or five quarters of college work. (institutions unable to generate class rank should use a 3.2 cumulative GPA.)

4. Graduate students who have been unconditionally admitted to a degree-granting program may be elected to membership upon completion of two graduate courses in Spanish with an average which, if continued, will make them eligible for a graduate degree.

5. Sigma Delta Pi does not descriminate on the basis of race, color, national or ehtnic origin, sex, age or disability.

                 
Individual chapters may increase, but not decrease, the membership criteria outlined in this article. All chapter requirements for membership must be clearly articulated in the chapter’s own published by-laws as approved by the chapter, the corresponding college or university and Sigma Delta Pi’s Executive Director (see Article XI, Section 2).

Please note that “the equivalent thereof” referred to in #1 also refers to courses by-passed when a student is admitted to your institution and placed in a course above the elementary language level. Six of the 18 semester credit hours in college-level Spanish MUST be above the intermediate language level, and three of these credit hours must be in a Hispanic literature, culture, civilization or Spanish for the professions course (considered a culture course). Also for #1, a student can be currently enrolled in the Spanish course that fulfills the 18-credit hours needed, but he/she can NOT be simultaneously enrolled in two or more Spanish courses that when added to the sum equal 18 hours.
 
The earliest an undergraduate student can qualify for membership is during his/her second semester of the sophomore year.

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