Engineering student resume examples & templates

You’ve worked hard to get your engineering degree; now it’s time to take that next step and get your first job!

A bland, thrown-together resume, however, won’t get you there. Even though this is your first job, you’ll need to design a well-structured resume to support your job-hunting endeavors.

What’s the blueprint for building that perfect engineering resume? It begins with having a strategic plan that goes step-by-step, puts your skills in the spotlight, and sets you apart from the crowd. 

Resume guide for an engineering student resume

Lay the foundation of a successful career with resume.io. With over 500 professions in our database, we have plenty of guides and resume examples to choose from, and our resume builder takes the guesswork out, so you can create your perfect resume quickly and easily.

This resume guide and corresponding engineering student resume example will cover the following:

• How to write an entry-level engineering resume
• Choosing the right resume format for engineering
• How to add your contact information
• Using summaries
• Adding your engineering experience
• Listing education and relevant experience
• Picking the right resume design/layout
• What the engineering market looks like, and what salary you can expect as a fresh grad

How to write an engineering resume as a student

The most important thing when starting your resume is to have a plan. And part of that plan is knowing what sections to include in your resume. An effective resume contains the following five sections:

• The resume header or contact information
• The resume summary (also known as a professional summary)
• The employment history section
• The resume skills section
• The education section

Your resume is like a set of building plans. You’re laying out your qualifications to the hiring manager. To do this, you need to have a solid foundation of information about the job, the company, and who is doing the hiring.

Part of this plan is figuring out what the company is looking for and then demonstrating why you’re the person to address those issues. This is your unique selling proposition—the things that make you special—and it’s the core of an effective resume.

This whole hiring process begins with your resume.  To land the job you want, stick to this plan:

• Highlight accomplishments in your previous roles, even if they’re not engineering-related. Don’t just list what you did day-to-day. Rather, show what value you brought to each role. Weave your accomplishments throughout your resume.
• Tailor each resume to the position and company you're applying for. Tweak the presentation and tone of each resume version to each engineering firm, just like you approach every project based on the specs presented in the plan.
• You may be a new grad, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be professional. Use a classic resume template, but one that conveys your fresh perspective.
• Since most jobs require an online application, incorporate appropriate keywords (taken from the job description) so it will pass the ATS screening software. You can accomplish this by using an ATS resume template.

Choosing the right resume format for engineering students

As an engineer, you’re organized and analytical, and your resume should reflect that.

Once you’ve got some experience under your belt, a good resume format for most engineering positions is reverse chronological. This format emphasizes the job history section, listed in reverse chronological order. This gives the “story” of your career thus far, starting with your current position and going back to your first job (if less than ten years ago). Below is an example of this format.

However, if you’re a recent engineering graduate without much practical experience, you might want to consider another format, such as the functional format. This format emphasizes your education and skills, and less on actual work history.

Fortunately, we have a variety of resume templates in our resume builder that are perfect for the entry-level engineer. Simply choose the format that best fits your current status. There are multiple versions of all three formats to choose from as resume examples so you can find the right one for you.

Wondering what an engineering resume should look like? Choose a clean, streamlined, simple layout that is easy for an engineering firm’s hiring manager to scan and interpret.

Include your contact information

Sure, your education and experience are important, but it won’t help you if the hiring manager doesn’t know how to reach you. The header is your resume’s contact info. 

To that end, your resume’s contact information should be easy to locate and look professional. 

Make sure to include:

• Full name & title. Provide your first and last name as well as the title of the position you’re applying for underneath.
• Professional email address. Use a separate email with a format like firstname.lastname@gmail.com. Avoid using your personal email that has a casual, funny username.
• Phone number. Your cell phone number is most likely your best bet, but make sure you re-record your voicemail greeting to sound professional.
• Location. This includes your city and state. Avoid giving your street address or zip code, as it can be unsafe and simply isn’t done anymore. Note ' Willing to Relocate' here if applicable.
• LinkedIn. If you have an up-to-date LinkedIn profile you can include it.
• Online portfolio. If your coursework in school included building a professional website or portfolio showcasing the projects you’ve worked on, include it here.

What not to include:

• Date of birth. Not needed and could potentially lead to age discrimination.
• Personal details. Avoid providing your marital status, religious or political affiliations, social security number, passport number, etc.
• Photo Headshot. Pictures are generally not included with resumes in the US unless you’re in a creative field. Leave it off your engineering resume.

Make use of a summary

A summary gives the reader (usually a hiring manager) a clear picture of who you are as a new engineer and the value you’d bring to the company.

The best place to do this is in your professional summary. In 2-3 sentences (maximum), you’re setting yourself up as the entry-level engineer they need to take their business into the future. A great summary highlights your engineering experience and potential and lets the hiring manager know you’re a forward-thinker and achiever, not just a day-to-day drone.

You can accomplish this goal using action verbs, generally in the present tense since you’re new to the job market: develop, organize, calculate, diagnose, and compute. Make sure to include quantifiable achievements (percentages, dollar amounts, and other numbers) where possible.

Resume summaries aren’t a “cut and paste” of information found elsewhere on your resume. They present talents and traits that make you a top engineering student. Remember your unique value proposition? This is the first place you’ll convey it. For example, “Proven ability to contribute to the product development and testing team as an intern, supporting a 20% improvement in Q3 manufacturing errors, product performance ratings, and overall client satisfaction feedback.”

The summary is a great place to define your brand and present a clear idea of who you are as a new engineer. What sets you apart? What talents do you possess that others might not? Use the summary to paint that picture.

You can find adaptable engineering resume examples summary below:

Outline your engineering work experience: a plan for success 

While you may not have practical engineering work experience, you still have valuable information to include in your work experience. List current (or most recent) relevant jobs, including engineering internships, at the top of the list and work your way back. Don’t bother with work experience that is unrelated to your job aspirations—these jobs can be included in a separate section called “Additional Experience.” 

Provide the company name and your job title, then give an overview of your achievements in brief bullet points, written in the third person (which means no “I” or “me” statements). Avoid vague references, and incorporate dynamic action verbs (in the current tense) that make an impact: collaborate, test, extrapolate, analyze, optimize, research, calculate, and innovate.

Don't list your day-to-day duties; talk about the outcome of your efforts. For example, have you ever seen lackluster descriptions in engineering resumes?

• "Helped with the new product lines."
• "Worked with other teams to support new engineering processes."
• "Experience with CAD software."

While these statements might be accurate, they don’t tell the reader what you’ve accomplished or the value you bring to an engineering team. You want to demonstrate that you are an achiever, not just a “doer.”

Instead of the above phrases, incorporate results-based points. Emphasize what you accomplished for the company, either as part of a team or on your own: processes that you supported (or improved), or collaborations that resulted in cost savings. 

Check out these reworked versions of the phrases above:

• "Assisted in the development of a new and improved product line, contributing to a 15% increase in market share within the six months of launch.”
• “Supported a cross-departmental initiative to implement “green” engineering practices, reducing the carbon footprint of manufacturing processes by 10%.
• "Led training sessions for new engineering interns on advanced CAD software, improving overall proficiency and reducing design errors by 17%.”

Take a look at the engineering student employment history resume sample below:

How to write an engineering resume with no experience

When writing an engineering resume without full-time work experience, you need to place your emphasis on transferable skills and your enthusiasm for the engineering field. 

Instead of worrying about your lack of practical experience, focus instead on your educational background in engineering, including internships, summer work, or school projects that align with the needs of the engineering field.

Emphasize any transferable skills that are useful for an engineer to possess. For example, if you have experience as a research assistant, highlight how this role strengthened your analytical and communication skills, which are important for an engineer to possess. 

Don’t discount any personal interests in engineering. A keen interest in green technology, building homes for the needy, or participating in robot-building clubs can help demonstrate your passion and your general, natural ability in engineering. 

Including these transferable skills and interests will help you stand out as a top candidate for an engineering position, even without practical work experience.

Include the relevant key skills that make you a great engineer in training

When assembling your list of skills, include both hard and soft skills that give a full picture of your training and educational experience. Hard skills like data analysis, computer literacy, or even quality control can give you a definite edge as you look for your first job. 

However, soft skills like adaptability, communication skills, and attention to detail can also position you as a desirable candidate.

If you need a little help, the resume builder offers several pre-written key skills to choose from with proficiency ranges you can set. You can also manually enter your skills.

Here’s what the skills box looks like in our engineering student resume template. 

Incorporate your skills throughout your resume by demonstrating how you used those skills in action, either in school projects or in internships.  This is not the place to be vague; give concrete examples of how you used the skills on the job and the results you obtained.

For example, in your work experience section and professional summary, highlight your 

• Technical skills by describing the programs and computer languages you’re fluent in and how you used them on the job to achieve your results.
• Teamwork skills by demonstrating how you contributed to a team’s success.
• Organizational skills by how you were able to manage your time and workload successfully.

Not sure what skills to include in your resume? Let the job description be your guide. It will let you know exactly what the employer is looking for, and you can align your skills accordingly.

Detail your education & relevant engineering courses

The education section is just that—a place to list your educational background. Like your work history section, list your academic achievements in reverse chronological order (if you use a functional or hybrid format, the order in which you list your education is the same, but will be higher up on the resume). Since you generally need at least a college degree to be an engineer, start with that and leave off your high school information. If you have a master’s degree, list that above your undergraduate degree.

But the education section is more than just the degrees you’ve earned (or will earn). You’ll also want to list any additional training, courses, or professional development.  For example,

• Training and certifications. Additional courses, industry certifications, or even additional computer training that enhance your skills in engineering.
• Internships. Company-provided training or internships. Training in other industries can be useful if the skills can transfer to the field of engineering.
• Student or professional organizations. Memberships in student or professional engineering associations, such as the Society of Women Engineers (SWE), demonstrate that you’re developing knowledge and skills in the engineering industry. Some organizations also offer scholarships for students.

At this point in your career, your educational experience is most likely more impressive than your work experience, so you might want to place it front and center at the top of your resume. Different from a reverse-chronological resume, this format is known as a functional resume and it emphasizes your education and transferable skills, and also demonstrates your enthusiasm and dedication to growth as an engineer. 

Pick the right resume layout and design for an engineering student resume

Your resume is like your highlight reel, showing off your best achievements in your academic career and your potential as an engineer of the future.

For this reason, your resume needs to stand out. Rather than just a laundry list of your school courses, it’s a chance for a potential to see you as an engineer, rather than just another applicant. When choosing the format and “look” of your resume, you want it to be clean, easy to read, and well-organized—but not dull.

Yes, you want to grab the reader’s attention, but you don’t want it to look trendy or be hard to read. No matter your experience level, you want it to say that you’re a professional who should be taken seriously. 

For an engineering student resume, we recommend a streamlined layout with distinct sections, a modern and legible font, and no or limited color. You’re an engineering professional looking to get your foot in the door, not applying for a summer job. Your resume design should reflect your ambitions. The engineering student resume sample here, for example, makes use of our Stockholm template—a simple but elegant layout with easily discernible section headers and a bit of blue for visual interest.

You can’t take a slapdash approach to creating a resume, and it takes a bit of time, but there are helpful tools like field-tested and expertly crafted resume templates, where the challenging formatting and layouts are already in place, ready for you to enter your information and craft an effective resume with a minimum of stress.

Engineering student text-only resume example

Engineering job market and outlook

Engineers are needed in a multitude of fields and specialties, so the demand for engineers has never been higher. Engineers need to stay current with their skills and technology, and the outlook for this field is expected to grow.

What type of salary you can expect in engineering

Engineers usually earn a salary for their work, as opposed to a commission, and often work long hours. While the salary varies depending on the area of specialization, the current median annual wage for mechanical engineers was $99,510 in May 2023.

Key takeaways for building an engineering student resume

You’ve worked hard to get your engineering degree and develop the requisite technological, analytical, and problem-solving skills. Your first resume must reflect your talents, skills, education, and enthusiasm for the industry. Make sure that it’s a clean, easy-to-read format that puts your education and training front and center.

Kickstart your engineering job search with our online resume builder, then supercharge it with resume.io. 

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