Golden Key National Honor Society was founded by James W. Lewis at Georgia State University in Atlanta, Georgia in 1977.[4] The original intent of the society was to create a new academic honor organization that was the equal of longstanding honor societies such as Phi Beta Kappa, but which did not carry the same perceived elitism of older institutions, operating more strictly on merit standards (by accepting students in the top 15% of their college classes, and permitting part-time and transfer students who excelled academically).[4] The society expanded over the course of the 1980s on a minimal budget, increasing the number of schools at which it had chapters and membership at those chapters.[4] Lewis moved the institution's headquarters to a former Church of Christ Scientist building in the Druid Hills area of Atlanta in 1984.[4] In the late 1980s, the society began attracting corporate sponsorships, providing data about its students to its sponsors, and holding large sponsored networking events, arguing that the strategy increased students' competitiveness in the job market.[4] It expanded to Australia in the mid-1990s,[2] and in 2000 changed its name to Golden Key International Honour Society in order "to reflect [its] international presence".[6]