How should I present my educational background on my resume? Should I include only the highest-level courses or also mention lower-level classes? What else should I add?

The average job seeker has over 15 years of experience. This means they’ve had plenty of time to accumulate a variety of skills and knowledge. Yet, employers often overlook resumes that don’t contain enough information about their applicants’ professional history.

You want to stand out from other candidates. That’s why you need to highlight your accomplishments and achievements. Your resume should reflect your career goals, so it’s important to choose relevant keywords and phrases.

If you have no work experience – make sure you focus on how well you can communicate, what you learned in school and how this will benefit you at work.

If you have little work experience but strong education, use this as an opportunity to showcase your skills and training with examples from class projects or volunteer activities.

Where should you list your education on your resume?

Your resume must be two pages – one page for your work history and one page for your education. The work history section should first describe your work and then detail your responsibilities (title, dates) with each position.

Your education section should list your major courses and any graduate degrees. You may also want to provide additional coursework taken outside of college.

If you are just starting out in your career, you may want to consider putting your education above your work experience. After all, employers often look at students and recent graduates as potential future employees.

So, if you’ve been working for a while now, it might make sense to place your education above your job history. However, if you have several degrees under your belt, don’t forget to include them in your resume.

How should you list your education on your resume?

At first, glance, listing your education on your résumé seems very simple, straightforward, and easy. You just put down every single school you’ve ever been enrolled in, in chronological order.

But what happens if you’re still in school, and you’ve already had some professional work experience? Or maybe you graduated college three years ago, and you want to update your CV now that you’re looking for a job.

Let’s say you went to school for four years, and you did well academically. Then you took a break for one year to travel the world. After that, you returned to school, and you completed your degree in six months.

Now you’re ready to apply for jobs. Should you list education before work history? What about work experience before education? Can you mix it up?

Let’s take a look at some real-life examples:

A recent graduate lists her education chronologically

This person listed her education before she had any work experience. She did this because she wanted to make sure employers knew she graduated from college.

This strategy works well if you want to show off your credentials without having to talk about your job history.

An experienced professional lists his education chronologically

The second example is different. Instead of listing education first, he listed it last. Why? Because he wants to highlight his work experience.

He knows that employers often prefer candidates with work experience over those without.

Another experienced professional list his education last

In this case, the candidate wants to emphasize his academic achievements. By listing his education last, he makes sure employers know how much he learned during his schooling.

What information about your education should you include?

Hiring managers are looking for three things when scanning resumes: They want to know what you studied, where you went to school, and how long ago you graduated.

If you don’t include those basic pieces of information, it could mean losing out on opportunities.

Hiring managers usually spend less than 30 seconds reviewing each candidate’s resume. To make sure you stand out among the rest, you need to provide the necessary information about your educational background.

Here’s what to include in the education section on your CV:

• The name of your school

• Location of your school

• Your major/degree

• Field of study

• Year(s) completed

• If you earned multiple degrees, list them chronologically

• Graduation date

How about your GPA or Grade Point Average?

The big debate around whether or not to include your GPA in your resume often revolves around what type of position you’re applying for.

If you’re looking for a job at a large law firm, having a high GPA might help you stand out from the crowd.

However, if you’re applying for a junior associate position at a smaller firm, your GPA probably doesn’t matter nearly as much because there aren’t many opportunities for associates at small firms.

Conclusion

Employers look for more than just academic qualifications when recruiting new employees. You’ll need to show them that you’re capable of performing certain tasks and responsibilities within an organization.

To convince potential employers that you are competent and qualified for a position, you must demonstrate your abilities through your resume.

It takes more than simply listing all your degrees in order. Instead, think about how you can differentiate yourself from others by highlighting specific skills and experiences that apply directly to the open positions available.

Additionally, a well-optimized resume will make you stand out more compared to just listing all your academic qualifications. Our team of experts can help you jumpstart your way to landing an interview.