Answered By: Katie Hutchison
Last Updated: Sep 14, 2016     Views: 2763

The library has several books on resume writing for additional help!  Just run a quick keyword search for resume in the book tab (from the red Search-A-Lot box).

Basics

  • A resume is a one-page document that outlines your work/volunteer/internship experience, skills, and educational background.
  • Most job applications require a resume.
  • Think of a resume as an opportunity. A resume is your chance to show off all of your great
    experience and skills to a potential employer. It’s also your chance to make a catalogue of all of your skills in one compact place.
  • Your resume should be persuasive. You’re trying to include the best information possible to get the specific job you’re applying for.
  • Your resume should be concise. It should be no longer than one page and should not use wordy
    language or fluff.  Be detailed, but brief!

 

Formatting Resumes

  • The Golden Rule of resume design is making it easy to read.  Avoid clutter and make things easy to find.
  • In determining section order, start with what’s most important and work down from there.
  • Try to stick to one font throughout and two at the very most. It keeps things consistent.  You can get a variety by mixing bold, italics, ALL CAPS, font size, alignment, and underlining.
  • Organize using white space, margins, columns, and how you divide things from line to line.
  • Place your name and contact info at the top of the page

Remember:

  • Proofread everything very, very thoroughly.
  • Do not include information from high school (unless you’re a freshman or sophomore).
  • Do not say “References available upon request.”  Leave that for your cover letter.
  • Do not include boring, overly general, cheesy, or unimpressive items under your Work Experience or Skills sections unless you ABSOLUTELY have to. For example
    - “proficient in Internet”

    - “kept office clean and organized”
    - “able to work long hours”
    - “answered phones and took down messages”

Mandatory Sections

Contact Info

  • All resumes should include contact information so that an employer can get in touch with you to offer you a job or an interview.  Make sure all your contact information is current.
  • Include: a phone number, mailing address, Web portfolio URL (if applicable), E-mail address*
     - *You may want to establish a “work” e-mail address for yourself if your current e-mail is something like crazyforcats@gmail.com or starchaser91@yahoo.com. Try firstname.lastname@gmail.com or a similar professional address.

Work Experience

  • List information for each relevant job, internship, or volunteer experience where you have worked.  Include the name of each company/organization, its location (city and state is enough), the dates you worked there, your position title, and your job responsibilities and achievements
  • This section can go in chronological order or in order of most relevance (whichever you think is more appropriate).
  • You can arrange this section by either company name or by position

Education

  • Include: names and levels of any degrees you have earned or are in the process of earning, names of majors and minors, names of institution(s) where you earned the degree(s), dates of graduation (or expected date).  GPA is optional.

Optional Sections

Skills

  • Computer software proficiency
    Example: Microsoft Excel, Adobe Photoshop, etc.
  • Languages
  • Job-specific skills
    Example: copy editing and photography for a journalism job
    Example: computer languages, skills, hardware knowledge for a computer science job
    Example: CPR certification for a nursing job

Honors and Awards

  • Dean’s list, department awards, scholarships, off-campus awards, contests
    *Keep these connected to what you’re applying for: don’t include the hot dog-eating contest you won (unless you’re applying for a job eating hot dogs!)

Objective

  • The objective should be short and concise, but it must also be tailored to the specific organization and position.  The objective should state the organization’s name and the specific position title, and then briefly outline how the applicant will help the organization achieve its goals.  Remember, the more specific, the better.
    Example: Objective: Help ABC Aerospace achieve its mission of designing tomorrow’s technology today by joining the Navigation Software Development Team as a programmer.

Other Optional Sections

  • Volunteer experiences
  • Activities
  • Leadership experience
  • Research experience
  • Relevant coursework
  • Publications
  • Certifications
  • Foreign Travel/Study abroad experiences
  • Professional organizations or Honors organizations memberships

Comments (1)

  1. For more reference, visit this: http://bestresumewritingreview.com/what-to-include-in-your-resume/
    by Sandra505 on Aug 25, 2013

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