Experience
The experience section of your resume will list all of the jobs you’ve worked at and outline all of the projects you’ve done at each job. It’s very important to gain some kind of relevant work experience before you graduate and start applying to full time positions. Below, I’ve listed ways you can develop the experience section of your resume for each grade level of college:
Freshman – It’s very difficult to acquire relevant work experience as a freshman. Your best bet at obtaining early programming exposure is to search within your school for positions in IT or web development. Bookmark your school’s on-campus job web site and visit it periodically. You can also check and see if your department has any openings for undergraduate research assistants. I highly recommend writing a cover letter when applying as a freshman because your resume will be too under developed to have a significant impact on its own.
Sophomore – When you reach the beginning of your sophomore year, you can start applying to small local companies. These types of places are usually open to hiring students for part time work / internships. Check your schools job listings to identify local companies that recruit at your school. Start attending career fairs. Again, write a cover letter. You can also look for and apply to scholarships that are packaged with internships. Usually, your major’s department will have listings of these type of awards.
Junior – As you enter your junior year, your resume should be developed enough so that you feel comfortable applying to any type of company. You can now expand your search distance beyond the state you live in. If you don’t have any work experience up until this point, it’s imperative that you obtain an internship during the summer between your junior and senior years. You can start searching for a summer internship as early as the fall semester.
Senior – Ideally, you don’t want to be in the position of having to enter your senior year without having had any relevant work experience. If you do end up in this predicament, one trick you can use is to push your graduation back an extra semester. This will give you another summer to try and find an internship.
Click here for Resume Development (part 3)
What's Next?
0 comments:
Post a Comment