My son will be graduating in June after a very rough few years with mental health battles, change of major, moving home etc. He started as a middle level math major (5 semesters) after initially thinking ministry…and when he took a leave of absence to work through his personal issues, he moved home and stayed at the same school, but switched to Online. The quickest path to graduation was to complete his degree as General Studies. He has decided he doesn’t at this time at least, want to pursue an alternate route/certification in teaching. He picked up a minor in Human Services, and is planning to pursue an entry level job in Social Work, and is interested in a variety of pathways.
All that to say, he has had no internships (lots of field study for education major but do we include that since his degree is not education?), no “real” job outside of retail and grocery stores. He has always been very involved in church as a youth group leader and a camp counselor. I think he hopes to continue to work with youth in a social services capacity. He would like to continue his education but the licensure is so specific and at this time not sure if he wants to go MSW, or something more like mental/behavioral health. We said he needs to work for a few years first to narrow down his interest.
Any resume experts or HR/recruiting folks have guidance for “first” resume?
The best resource for resume help is generally the university career center. They can work wonders massaging all kinds of experiences into meaningful bullet points for a resume.
FWIW, it sounds like your student will have many experiences to draw from!
Your son’s experiences in both retail and education (student teaching, field work) have a LOT of transferable skills that will not only help him land an entry level job, but will also help with grad school acceptances down the road (MSW, counseling etc). Do not underestimate the value of these positions, the stories he can share etc.
Transferable skills that he learned (important for jobs and school) include public facing experiences, advising/helping students and families, learning how to take complex topics and simplify them to teach others, improving organization, learning how to deal with supervisors and difficult coworkers, recognizing mistakes and what he did to turn them around, problems encountered and how he solved them, working with people who may be different than yourself, ethical situations he may have faced and how he handled them etc. These are just a few examples of real life transferable skills.
I would look into the career center as well as different resume sites, as noted. They will help with the wording of his prior positions and how to help frame transferable skills …for the employment he is seeking.
Check out this website and look at the resume template named New Graduate Resume - Hybrid Resumes and Cover Letters – Baton Rouge Career Center It’s all free, part of our local public library’s very good Career Center.
I would use something along that line. But I would break up his work experience into two sections, “Relevant Experience”, where you list his relevant volunteer/church/youth group experience and his student teaching experience. You treat the volunteer roles just like jobs but label the job title with “volunteer”, e.g. “Volunteer Youth Group Leader”, “Volunteer Camp Counselor”. Then you have a section “Work Experience”, where you list his actual work experience, retail etc.
He does have relevant experience, his volunteer work and also his education field experience count! Social or Human Services are a relatively easy field to enter (at least in my area). Due to low salaries there is quite a bit of turnover, so jobs become open frequently.
Your state or even local public library may have local resources, & in person events for job seekers as well.
So much preliminary screening is done via phone or zoom now, (that is what my kids / their friends are experiencing).