How to craft a winning resume as a college student in 2024

🤝 Why you should trust us 🤝 
All our tips for you are straight from real-world experience. Working in the campus recruitment space, we chat with the people who hire students & fresh grads all the time, so we know what they look for. Plus, we hire people ourselves too! 

Your resume is one of the most important documents for launching your career. Unfortunately, it's also one of the trickiest to get right.

Fear not: We’ve created a great guide full of tips and examples to help you make a resume that stands out for internships. Let's dive in!

1. Why do resumes matter?
2. How do I make my resume stand out?
3. How long should my resume be?
4. How should I structure my resume? What information should I include?
5. What design and layout should I use for my resume?
6. Steps to review and finalize your resume
7. FAQs

#1 Why do resumes matter?

But first, why are resumes so important? Let's step into the shoes of an employer for a moment. Employers get loads of applications for each job and can't interview everyone.

Just think, if a manager had to interview thousands of people for each opening, they'd have no time left for their actual work!

That's where resumes come in. They help narrow down the list to those who look promising for an interview – and a well-crafted resume can spark an employer's interest in getting to know more about you.

So, your resume is not just a formality—it's your ticket to an interview. If it doesn't stand out, you don't get an interview. That's why you want to get it right!

#2 How do I make my resume stand out?

Wondering how to make your resume pop? It's all about staying on point. Think about it like this: When you're telling a story, do you include every single detail? Probably not! 

Treat your resume in the same way. Instead of boring recruiters with everything you've ever done, pick out the highlights. Remember, the goal is to make it quick and easy for recruiters to understand your qualifications and decide if you're a good fit.

Here's a simple way to make sure you stay on point.

1. Look at the job post: What skills and qualities are they asking for? Write those down.
2. Match it up: Next to each item from the job post, write down your skills, experiences, and achievements that show you've got what they need.

Literally, that's all you need to do to stand out! No hacks, gimmicks, bells or whistles. Just hone in on what employers want!

📣 Hear from a recruiter

I'm going to tell you what DOES impress me:

1. A clean, simply formatted, easy to read resume that leaves no doubt you are qualified for the role you're applying to
2. Please refer to 1.
3. I'm not even kidding it's just 1 

– Recruiter @ Amazon 

#3 How long should my resume be? 

For students, we recommend a resume length of one page.

Think about it like this: Recruiters are busy people, who review hundreds of resumes in a day. They will appreciate a resume that's straight to the point like we discussed in the previous section – and forcing everything onto one page is a great way to stay on point.

#4 How should I structure my resume? What information should I include?

Most resumes can be organized into the following sections:

• Heading & contact details
• Summary (optional)
• Education
• Experience
• Skills (optional)
• Awards (optional)
• Interests (optional)

Let’s jump in and take a closer look at each section!

Heading & contact details

The main heading should be your first and last name. No need to write "resume" next to your name (e.g. "Peter Smith Resume") – recruiters know what they're reading!

Next, you should include your contact details. This includes:

• Your phone number so that recruiters can easily reach out to clarify anything. Make sure your voicemail message is professional – no "Hey, You've reached my number. I'll call back when I feel like it! Jkjkjk lol!"
• Your email address. Put down your .edu email address and make sure it's spelled correctly – or recruiters may have trouble contacting you!
• Your location. Simply specify your city and state (e.g. Boulder, CO). Your full address is not needed until you've been officially hired.
• Your LinkedIn: If you include your LinkedIn profile, make sure to purge it of anything that might reflect poorly – e.g. angry rant posts!

You can include other links depending on the role. For example, if you're applying for a digital marketing role, you might include links to your Instagram and Tiktok. If you're a budding software developer, Github is great. If you have an online portfolio that shows you'd be qualified for an internship, share it!

✅ Do hyperlink all links (including email) to make it easier for recruiters to connect with you.

🚫 Do NOT include personal details like your age, gender, date of birth, or marital status. (It is actually against the law in most states for employers to ask you about these things!)

Summary (optional)

You'll often see resumes that start with a Summary section. It might be titled something along the lines of "Profile," "Objective" or "About Me" and include a few lines explaining who the person is and what they bring to the table.

Depending on who you ask, summary statements are either essential or a waste of space. For every recruiter who reads them, there's another one who doesn't even glance at them – remember, they've got tons of resumes to review and not a lot of time!

Our advice?

🚫 Do NOT include a summary if your "story" is pretty straightforward. For example, if you're an accounting student applying for an accounting role, employers will have no trouble figuring out your reasons for applying. Skip the summary and save that space for your Experiences and Skills sections instead.

✅ Do include a summary if there's a "twist" to your story – something that might puzzle employers. For example, if your degree is in one field but you want to work in a totally different one. Or if you live in one country but are applying for a job on the other side of the world. That's where a summary can clear things up!

Philosophy graduate with a proven track record in software development, demonstrated in a final year project where I used Java and Python to create software that makes ethical decisions. Ready to bring my practical coding experience and analytical background to tackle complex challenges in the tech industry.

Second-year philosophy student with practical coding experience since high school. Most recently used Android Studio to develop a wellness app that helps college students destress.

📌 Note: You can also explain all this in your cover letter. However, not all recruiters read cover letters these days, so it could help to include this information in your summary too.

Education

Now onto the real first section of your resume: Education. Note that employers don't care about education as much when hiring experienced candidates.

But when you're just starting out? It's what you should put at the top of your resume. Here's what you absolutely must include in this section:

• Your college or university (duh!).
• Your degree. This gives employers an idea of what skills you might have. For more technical roles, you may even be screened out based on your degree alone.
• Start & completion dates (or expected completion dates). Include the month and year. This lets employers know whether you're still a student and when you're available to start working, among other things.

Here are some extra things you can put in this section — assuming they make you look good and are relevant to the role!

• Your grades: If you have a GPA of 3.5 or higher, show it off! If not, leave it off.  
• Coursework: Generally, you don't need to highlight specific courses you took since they don't tell recruiters that much (most students in your degree probably took the same courses!). But you should mention coursework if you're applying for something that doesn't align with your degree. For example, if you're applying for an internship at an accounting firm without an accounting degree, you could still get hired if you highlight that you've done well in relevant courses like business law and financial planning.
• Your high school: You can include the name of your high school alongside noteworthy achievements and leadership positions – especially if they tie into a broader theme you want to highlight. For example, if a job requires strong analytical skills, a high SAT math score can help you make your case.
• Your senior thesis, capstone project, or other research projects if relevant.
• Academic awards.
• Training, licenses, or accreditations, e.g. micro-credentials or industry certifications. 
• Study abroad experience.

🚫 Do NOT feel a need to include any of the above if they aren't relevant or would reflect poorly on you. Remember: Your resume is meant for you to show off your strengths!

What order to put your experiences in

When it comes to arranging your experiences on your resume, you've got a couple of choices. Pick the one that makes it easier to convince recruiters that you're the one!

1. Reverse chronological order (most recent first): This is the traditional and most widely used format. It lists your experiences starting with the most recent and working backwards. It's straightforward and preferred by many employers as it clearly shows your career progression.

2. Order of relevance: If you don't have a clear career progression (e.g. you've jumped around and tried out different things), lead with your most relevant experiences, regardless of when they occurred. Think about it like this: If you start with less relevant experiences, there's a risk a busy recruiter might miss the good stuff and overlook your resume.

What to say about your experiences

For each experience, include:

• Your job title. Put this first since employers want to know what you did.
• The organization's name. If the name doesn't clearly indicate the kind of organization it is, you may need to include a sentence or two that describes it.
• Your start and finish dates (month & year is fine).
• Your accomplishments in bullet points, starting with your most relevant accomplishments.

You'll notice we said "accomplishments." Most applicants make the mistake of listing out their duties & responsibilities. Well, that doesn't tell employers if you did a good job! Instead, focus on your accomplishments instead – i.e. what you did really well, what you learned, or how you helped out.

For example, if you managed a student association's social media accounts, don't just say that – anyone can manage social media accounts! Instead, try something like this: 

Elevated [student association's] online presence by managing their social media accounts, resulting in a 30% increase in follower engagement within six months.

Here are more tips on writing about your experiences:

• Make your experience relevant. Highlight why each experience is relevant to the role you're applying for. For example, don’t just say you "worked in a bar"— describe how working in a 200-person capacity venue required exceptional customer service, dispute resolution skills, excellent time management, or any other qualities the employer is looking for. 
• Quantify your impact. Use numbers to highlight your actions and results. Specify things like how much, how often, how long, and how many to paint a clear picture of your impact.
• Make it about you. If you say you were "involved with" a project, employers might assume you played a minor role. To convey your active involvement, use action verbs like ‘designed’, ‘built’, and ‘organized’ and provide specific examples of how you solved a problem, took the lead on something, or significantly contributed to a successful outcome. 
• Keep it simple. It’s tempting to use industry jargon to look smart. But often, the first person to read your resume won't be an expert. They'll most likely be a recruiter, hiring for all kinds of roles across their organization (e.g. marketing, sales, finance, engineering, etc). If they can't understand your resume because it's too full of jargon, they'll most likely just skip it. So keep your resume easy to read and interesting for anyone, not just experts!

Here are some examples to help put all this into practice:

Instead of this…	Try this...
❌ Data entry and analysis in excel.	✅ Modeled 25 years of historical financial data in excel to determine relationship between commodity prices and profitability.
❌ Bar work including waiting tables, working the bar & hosting wine tastings.	✅ Managed 200 person capacity bar, requiring exceptional customer service, dispute resolution, and time management.
❌ Chair of soccer club social committee.	✅ Chaired social committee of 8 and organized events throughout the year attended by 200-300 members.
❌ Tutored high school students.	✅ Developed tutorial content, marketing, pricing, and time management strategies to establish a successful small business tutoring high school students.
❌ Launched internal team productivity reporting dashboard.	✅ Liaised with senior leadership and sought team feedback to develop a productivity reporting dashboard that cut weekly team task allocation time by approximately 50%.
❌ Organized the college’s tutorial program and headed up the academic team.	✅ Planned and led a year-long academic program for 230 students across 8 faculty areas, resulting in a 98% pass rate.
❌ Edited articles submitted by student journalists.	✅ Reviewed 20-25 articles per week to evaluate their suitability for publication, selecting and editing up to 5 per week for publication.
❌ Researched CRM SAS options.	✅ Collaborated on a team of 4 to evaluate alternative software platforms to drive sales team productivity, ultimately saving an estimated $600,000 per year.

Skills

When recruiters check your resume, they're on the lookout for skills that match the job. That's why it's a good idea to list your skills in one place. You make it easy for them to find what they're looking for!

Technical Skills: Java, Python, Data Analysis, SQL
Foreign Languages: French (professional), Spanish (conversational)

✅ DO

• Highlight technical skills. For example, if you're an accounting student, mention any accounting software you're familiar with. Employers mainly want to know that you've learned to work with different software (even if it's not the one they use), as this shows you have the potential to pick up others on the job if necessary.

🚫 Do NOT

• Mention skills that everyone is expected to have, like email and Microsoft Word.
• Highlight soft skills like "teamwork" or "communication." You can show how you've used these skills in your experiences or through any awards you've got, but listing them by themselves won’t be very convincing.
• Use self-scoring graphics (where you rate yourself out of 5 for certain skills). These might look great on the page, but they’re rarely helpful for a recruiter, as they have no idea what standard you're measuring yourself by

Awards

As a student, awards are a way to set yourself apart and prove you have the drive and skills to excel. They show potential employers that you've been recognized for your achievements, making you a more attractive candidate in their eyes.

If you have two or more awards, you can feature them in their own section. (Otherwise, just put your award in the most relevant place – e.g. an academic award in the Education section.)

Here are some examples of awards you might include and the skills they demonstrate. 

Awards	Recruiters will think you have ...
Debate awards	Strong communication skills, the ability to think quickly under pressure
Maths or Science awards	Strong analytical skills
Hackathon awards	Strong technical, teamwork, and problem-solving skills

✅ DO

• Briefly describe each award: e.g. "for leadership and service," or "granted to the top 5% of students in [Subject]." An award won't matter if employers haven't heard of it!
• Put your most relevant awards first. 

💡Pro tip: Many recruiters focus on the Education and Experience part of your resume. So if you have a lot of impressive awards that you don't want recruiters to miss, put this section between your Education and Experience sections.

Interests (optional)

A section on hobbies and interests can be a great conversation starter with a recruiter. And who knows? Your unique hobby might just resonate with the interviewer, giving you an extra edge.

However, if your hobbies consist of hanging out with friends or watching TV, it's probably best to skip this section.

If you do include hobbies:

• Pick ones you're passionate about and can discuss at length. If you're asked about a hobby and struggle to explain why you like it, recruiters may get suspicious.
• Try including hobbies that are relevant to the role. For example, if you're applying for a finance role and you enjoy investing in the stock market in your free time, write that!

#5   What design and layout should I use for my resume?

We've left design for the end – and for good reason.

Many people obsess over how the resume is formatted. The truth is ... WHAT you say matters more than how you FORMAT what you say. In screening resumes, I have seen dozens if not hundreds of formats. Many different formats can work. – Former resume screener @ McKinsey

These days, unless you’re applying for a design role, there’s no need to make a resume from scratch. Most people just use ready-made templates, and recruiters are cool with that.

Here are some free templates to help you out. When you’re choosing, think about:

• The industry: Traditional sectors like finance or law often prefer classic, more conservative styles – think: black text on white paper.
• The company vibe: If the place you’re applying to is all about new ideas and being different, then you can try something a bit more modern and creative.
• How much you've got to say: Got loads of achievements and projects to talk about? You’ll need a template that fits all your info without looking squashed. Skip those super sparse ones with lots of empty space.

If you decide to tweak a template or make your own, here are some things to keep in mind.

• Headers: Headers are titles that mark the start of different sections on your resume, such as "Education," "Experience," and "Skills." Use a bigger font size and/or color to make them stand out so recruiters can find what they need quickly.
• Bullet points: Instead of writing paragraphs, break things down into short, snappy points. Each bullet point should be 1-2 lines max. Recruiters usually don’t have time to read big blocks of text!
• Font: Use a simple and clean font like Calibri or Arial. Keep the size between 11-12 so it’s easy to read — 10 at the smallest. You don’t want anyone squinting!
• Bold words: If you know a job is looking for certain skills, make those words stand out in bold: e.g. “Experienced in Java and Python".
• White space: Don’t pack every inch with text. A bit of empty space makes your resume easier on the eyes and less crowded.

#6 Steps to review and finalize your resume

• Always ask someone else to read over your resume. You’ll be amazed at the typos a friend or family member can catch. And if you're applying for a role that requires you to be detail-oriented (e.g. a quality control role), you'd better make sure there aren't any mistakes in your resume!
• Ask for additional feedback from your careers service center. Most colleges offer a free resume review for current students.
• Once you’re happy with the final version, save the file as a PDF. Give your PDF a professional title (such as “Jane Smith resume”). 
• Do a final FINAL review of the PDF version before you submit it. And make sure you upload the correct version!

Good luck!

#7 FAQs

Should I include a picture on my resume?

No, it's not really helpful. Plus, some employers will actually ask you not to include a picture so they can avoid unconscious bias (i.e. making decisions based on subjective things like looks).

What file type should I use?

Unless directed otherwise, always submit your resume in PDF format. Why? The hint is in the name - ‘Portable Document Format’.

This format ‘freezes’ your desired formatting in place, so your document displays in the same way regardless of the software, hardware or operating system that recruiters use to view your resume.

If you're asked to submit a Microsoft Word document, make sure to it's in the '.doc' file format (not '.docx'), as it doesn't require the latest version of Microsoft Word.

Should I include my gender pronouns on my resume?

Including gender pronouns on a resume is a personal choice. In recent years, there has been a growing trend of individuals including their preferred gender pronouns to avoid any potential misgendering.

Unfortunately, this is not as widely accepted among employers as it should be, and one study even found that resumes with non-binary gender pronouns ("they/them") got passed up more for interviews. 

Do I need to customize my resume for each employer? 

No. Employers in the same industry tend to look for similar qualities, so you can just use one resume for the whole industry.

However, if you're applying for different roles in the same industry, you'd still want to modify your resume to highlight experiences that best match the job description for each role.

💡 Pro tip: Create a ‘master’ version of your resume that covers everything. This allows you to select appropriate content from the master version as a starting point for each position and employer.

Can I get ChatGPT to write my resume for me?

Nope, don't let an AI tool write your whole resume. As an employer ourselves, we can assure you that it's painfully obvious when someone outsources their application to ChatGPT!

If you do use an AI writing tool, use it wisely. For example, you can ask ChatGPT to brainstorm keywords to include or to edit your resume for clarity, relevance, and impact. Just don't get it to generate a resume without putting any thought into it.

Can I lie on my resume?

No, lying on your resume is not a good idea because:

1. Recruiters are skilled at spotting things that don’t add up. They talk to lots of candidates and are good at telling when something is off. If they find out you’re not being truthful, they won’t trust you anymore.
2. Before giving you a job, employers will check your references. That means they’ll contact the professors or bosses you said you’ve worked with. If your stories don’t match up, they’ll know something’s wrong.

Plus, the professional world can be small. People talk, and a lie can follow you around, making it hard for you to get a job later on. It’s always better to be honest and show what you can really do.

Can I put requests on my resume?

No, do not mention requests for things like special working hours or days off. It’s best to cover this in your interview.

Should I include references in my resume?

No. Most reference checks will only be done at the end of the recruitment process, and recruiters often complete them using an online workflow, so there’s no benefit to taking up valuable space on your resume with references.

The only exception to this is if you have a particularly influential referee and you feel it will help your case to ’name drop’ them on your resume.

Don’t bother writing “references available on request". It goes without saying that you would provide references if an employer asked for them.