College is the entry point for the professional world. Students start internships, practice, and jobs by the final year or during the study. A resume is a significant form of document to ensure the proper entry for a successful career ahead. Recruiters and employers find a professional-looking and organized resume more impressive because it shows organizational skills, dedication, and seriousness towards the career.
Given the importance of a resume for a career, it is essential to know how to make a resume for college students that stands apart from the crowd.
Before moving ahead with steps and tips for resume building, it is essential to know what a resume is.
What is Resume?
It is a piece of paper or short video that includes the candidate’s introduction, skills, educational qualifications, achievements (if any), job experience, hobbies, and personal information. It is a brief introduction to understand the candidate before appearing for the interview. Recruiters go through resumes carefully to get an idea about the candidate and why he/she should be hired or canceled.
There is a proper way to organize a resume according to career interests, degree, and skills, etc., to make the resume more appealing in front of the employer.
Before starting to write the resume, some tips are helpful to know how to make a resume for college students, which will make their candidature more authentic and effective.
Tips for writing the first resume for the college students
Highlight Educational Qualification
Education details are the most significant part of the resume for college students. For college students, the employer expects a better degree, not job experience, because very unlikely a student possesses any real job experience.
Degree education is full-time work. The recruiter understands that, but it should be appropriately mentioned in the resume and how the student is suitable for the position.
Given the importance of education details, it should be mentioned appropriately in a structured way.
Points to include in the Education section of the resume
- College Name
- Nature of Degree: Master’s or Bachelor’s
- Residence, City, State
- Expected Graduation month and year
- Mention GPA score only if it is above 3.5 for a better impression
- Include rewards, awards, prizes, etc
- Any certification relevant to the job during college years would increase selection prospects.
Relevant Experience Section
As a college student, it is very likely that the student doesn’t have any professional experience. But it does not mean that there is nothing to show in the experience section.
There are NGOs, extracurricular activities, certifications, etc., for getting relevant experience, which can be included in the resume. It is better to replace traditional Professional Experience with a Relevant Experience section on the resume.
To stand apart from the crowd, students need to innovate and include new ideas in resume making. Relevancy matters the most because it determines how much value you are going to add to the organization.
Here is the list of relevant experiences; choose the suitable one for the career and include it in the resume. The Relevant Experience section covers most of the space on resumes for college students.
Go through the below-given list of relevant experiences and use the concerned category in the section.
Relevant College Certificate course
- Volunteer work experience
- Education from Abroad
- Extracurricular activities
- Internships
- College clubs or Educational club membership
- Membership of Musical groups
Employers decide based on relevant work experience, so spend some time writing this section. To make them more visible, use bullet points.
Explain work details, project description, role, and position in the execution of the project. Try to include numbers, data, graphs if possible, on the resume. Employers find such resumes more professional and organized. A resume with data and numbers conveys precise capability, work knowledge, and organizing skills.
If it is about some research work, include information regarding page count, number of interviews, and people interviewed in the relevant experience section. It will give the resume more weightage and impact in front of the interviewer.
Skills section
Hard Skills
- MS Office
- Google Drive Suite
- Writing and editing
- Research
- Photoshop
Soft Skills
- Teamwork and collaboration
- Work ethic
- Time Management
- Communication
- Adaptability and Flexibility
Apart from these common skills that one learns through college days, it is always better to add specialized certifications or technical skills for better resume compatibility. Special skills such as advanced excel, photoshop editing, online certifications for technical courses and games and certificates from extracurricular activities, etc.
Though there is no need to learn technical stuff for soft skills, these are very crucial for any job and business. Soft skills are essential for any business and job.
Structure of Resume
Resume Heading
The top section of the resume should include the name, contact details of the candidate.
Resume Summary
The resume Summary is the highlight of the resume. It includes what a candidate desires to be, what he/she wants to learn and contribute to the company etc.
Education
As discussed in the above paragraphs, educational qualifications deal with academic details, percentage, marks, and the passing date.
Relevant Experience
This section is about relevant experience for the job.
Skillset
Last but not least, mention soft, hard, and specialized skills to make the perfect resume for the bright career ahead.
Conclusion
A resume is a fundamental criterion for a job application and impression before recruiters. It could be really tough work to do for the first time applying for a job without experience, especially in the times of Covid-19 scenario. So, before writing the resume, do proper research about how to make a resume for college students and include three major sections: education, skillset, and relevant experience mentioned above to draft the best resume for campus selection, job interview, research, or any other interview.
