Career Services Rights Resumes
Written by Alicia Secord | 
It seemed fitting that the first workshop held by the Career Services office on Aug. 25 was a resume building workshop. When conducting a job search, the resume is often the first step. The resume is the first thing many employers see, and it is used by employers to decide who to interview. Job seekers must therefore have a resume that will make them stand out.
“You should have a resume for every job you apply for,” said Katrina Stanley-Blue, Associate Director of Career Services. “A mistake many students make is sending out the same generic resume to many employers. The resume should be as specific to that job as possible.”
Blue gave students participating in the workshop helpful tips about words to avoid and good ways to describe relevant experience. The workshops, which were open to all students, taught students to use a service called Optimal Resume, which is now available to current students and alumni through the career services webpage.
Students focused on developing resumes that would be eye catching to Human Resource Directors and showcase their talents appropriately. Often, students list unrelated job experience because it is the only experience they have.
Instead, job seekers should only list the experience that is related to their field of work. This experience may be in the form of coursework, volunteering, or work study.
The Optimal Resume program guides users through the process of writing a resume by offering templates for specific majors and types of jobs. One advantage of using Optimal Resume is it stores multiple resumes for up to a year after they have been last edited. The program also offers lists of action verbs and suggestions on how to describe previous experience.
The three students that attended the 1 p.m. workshop were pleased with their new resumes. One of the students, Kyle Kiker, was a freshman professional golf management major seeking an internship. He was able to list relevant coursework and career aspirations. Dr. Bonita Belcastro, professor of social work, brought two senior students from one of her classes to the seminar. These students were seeking jobs to launch their career after graduation.
Belcastro said she encourages her students to utilize the career services offices both to find jobs during school and careers after graduation.
“If you were to go to an outside consulting firm it would cost a lot more,” said Belcastro. “Students should take advantage of the resource while they are here, it’s part of your tuition, so use it.
Whether looking for an internship, summer job, or career for after graduation, career services has many helpful resources for any job seeker. Like many of the development offices at
The Office of Career Services will be hosting more workshops throughout the semester. More information can be found at their office on the lower level of the
Sidebar: “5 Tips on Writing a Resume”
1. Have a resume for every job application.
2. Make your “objective” as job specific as possible.
3. Don’t list unnecessary experience or experience that is more than ten years old.
4. Don’t use relatives as references.
5. Keep it simple.
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