Common Myths about Resumes

Hello everyone! As a college student, writing that first resume can be intimidating. Many students just don’t even know where to start. Then there’s the added pressure of actually using it to obtain an internship, or that full-time position. In the end, students should realize that your resume is often times the first representation of you to a potential employer.

Ok, so hopefully I haven’t just made you even more intimidated by the resume writing process, but gave you some motivation to start now! But before I give you some helpful tips and explain some myths associated with resumes, I should explain who I am. My name is Tiana and I’m currently a junior Human Resource Management major at UWEC. I’ve worked on campus at Career Services for 3 years now, and I can genuinely say that Career Services has helped me immensely in preparing for college and beyond. It’s definitely a place that no student should be a stranger to.

With my experience in helping students with their resumes, I’ve heard many common myths that students have about resumes. I would like to clear up just a few of them:

Myth #1: You don’t need to start writing a resume until your Junior or Senior year of college. FALSE! It’s never too early to put together a rough draft of your resume. Even as a freshman, you can gather relevant information, and create a format so it’s easy to add experiences as you get them. Plus, writing a resume when you don’t have application deadline pressures makes the process a lot less stressful.

Myth #2: The “templates” that programs like Microsoft Word offer are good to use when writing a resume. Generally, that’s FALSE. Although many students think they’re taking a shortcut to complete their resume, they could be wrong. Templates make it hard to add any personal touches to your resume. And they are VERY recognizable to recruiters, who may think students weren’t interested in the position enough to create their own resume.

Myth #3: A 1-page resume is much better than one that is 2-pages long.
FALSE. You will get MANY different opinions on this one, but I think it’s becoming more and more acceptable to have a 2-page resume. Many students are gaining a lot of relevant experience through internships, campus organizations, and coursework, and some find it hard to fit all of it on 1-page. If this is the case for you, just make sure your second page is at least 2/3 long.

I should explain that although these are my opinions coming from my experiences with resumes and employer preferences, there will be some that argue with me. Ultimately, it is up to you. After all, you know yourself better than anyone when it comes to your experience and preferences.

Career Services offer FREE resume review service to all students. So… if this has inspired you to create or modify your resume, but you still have some questions, please take advantage of this free service! Trained Career Associates can give you suggestions on everything from formatting to content. So don’t feel intimidated by the whole topic of resume writing. In the end, it turns out to be a valuable learning experience that directly helps your future!