Crafting a Resume

A resume allows you to showcase your skills and experience to employers. Your resume should market yourself to a potential employer for a specific job. A recruiter wants to know what you know and what you have done. The key to a good resume is giving the recruiter this information simply and effectively. Your resume should be tailored to the job and company you apply to! There are a couple general rules to keep in mind:

  • Keep bullet points concise and to a single line
  • Order of your resume sections after listing education is important. Sections of the resume should be reordered based on most important (and strongest) area
  • List dates for all necessary items on your resume
  • List locations for all items on your resume
  • Be sure to include company or organization names for all items

 

Six sections should be in generally included on an undergraduate resume:

  1. Heading
    1. Include name, address, phone number, e-mail, citizenship status, and portfolio address (if applicable)
  2. Education
    1. Only list college experience, not high school, unless you are a 1st year
    2. List college name and degree field. List minor or concentration if applicable
    3. Provide expected date of graduation
    4. Only list overall GPA if above a 3.0. List Major GPA if higher than overall GPA
    5. Can list major GPA if above a 3.0
  3. Experience (Work for Compensation) 
    1. List any internship, or research experience that is relevant to the job posting
    2. List the organization name followed by your position title the line below
    3. Put major tasks from each individual experience as bullet points under each
    4. Bullet points should be a summarization of work rather than everything you did
  4. Academic Projects
    1. List relevant school projects accomplished during classes or organizations
    2. List the class/organization followed by the school (if applicable)
    3. Below the title, add the title of your role in the project
    4. Summarize project tasks and important results during the project
  5. Skills
    1. Break down your major into category of useful skills. For example, Mechanical Engineering would be Instrumentation, Mechanical, Manufacturing, Software, Communication.
    2. Use concepts/skills you learned in individual classes
    3. Only put skills you have knowledge of
    4. Do not list class taken, but rather, the concepts from each course
  6. Leadership
    1. List leadership positions you have had (i.e. sports clubs, academic clubs, fraternity positions)
    2. List the organization followed by your position title below
    3. Describe responsibilities of each position as bullet points