Spring Cleaning Your Resume

The official date of Spring is near (March 20 to be exact). Why not do a little spring-cleaning on your resume? Here are some tips for deciding what to include and exclude on your resume.



High School Information

If you are a sophomore, this is usually the time that we suggest removing your high school activities and hopefully replacing it with college experience. It is important to start getting involved on campus and gaining experience outside of the classroom during your first few years of college. Replacing your high school experience with your college organizations and experiences will help you in keeping your resume concise.

“Work history” or “Experience”

You do not want to include EVERYTHING that you have done in your whole life. Look at what experience or jobs relate to your current career objective and exclude those positions that are unrelated. If you gained essential skills from an unrelated position, feel free to include that experience under “Other Experience” section. Do not go back more than five years for work experience unless it strongly relates to your current career objective.

“Additional Information”

Include this category only if the content will include more information than interests and hobbies, and if it will expand the information related to the career objective, e.g., a farm background if the job desired is in agribusiness. Also include any specialized skills, training, certification, or licenses not related to the career objective such as foreign language ability, ability to sign for the deaf, pilot’s license, chauffeur license, CPR, etc. Many employers desire computer skills and you may want to include this information depending on your skill level.




Overall, your resume will change depending on what job you are applying for. Remember, cater your resume to fit the employer’s job requirements and make sure that you double-check for grammatical errors and formatting issues.