08/2016 - 09/2019, HR Receptionist, McCann Agency, New York
- Worked as an energetic receptionist, using strong administrative skills to enhance company performance.
- Served as a main point of contact for the HR department.
- Wrote reports from dictation and reported to my superiors with said information.
- Made copies, sent faxes, made phone calls, and researched assignments for superiors.
- Organized and dispersed incoming mail to correct departments and employees.
- Reported to superiors on a weekly basis.
- Approached each work day with enthusiasm and a wonderful work ethic.
07/2013 - 07/2017, Head Counselor, Little Cat's Day Camp, White Plains
- Worked as a head counselor for a summer camp serving 280+ children.
- Organized and led group trips, remaining responsible for 20+ children at a time.
- Greeted families and campers with a friendly spirit and a helpful attitude.
- Handled disputes between campers with professionalism and sensitivity.
- Remained knowledgeable about the allergies and medical needs of campers, seeking medical attention whenever necessary.
- Served as a leader, and a confidante to countless campers.
- Promoted fun and learning each and every day.
08/2012 - 05/2016, High School Diploma, Greenwich Academy, Greenwich
- Graduated with High Honors.
- Member of the Swim Team.
- Member of the Softball team.
- Staff Writer of the Sacred Heart Newspaper.
- Member of the Photography Club.
- Graduated with High Honors.
- Interpersonal Communication Skills
- Love of Learning
- Analytical Thinking Skills
- Complex Problem Solving
- Photography Skills
- Time Management Skills
A resume for college application gives admissions officers a clear, organized picture of who you are beyond your grades and test scores. This guide covers what to include, how to format your document, and what makes a college admissions resume work, with resume examples on this page to show you exactly what strong looks like in practice.
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How to create a college resume that stands out
Writing a resume for college admissions is different from writing one for a job.
Your audience is an admissions officer, not a hiring manager, and what they want to see is sustained commitment, personal growth, and the kind of student you will be on their campus.
The resume sits alongside your application, essays, and recommendations as one more piece of evidence of who you are.
Follow these four steps to build yours.
1. Choose the right format for a college resume
Keep your resume clean, readable, and professional.
Use a standard font such as Georgia, Garamond, or Cambria in size 10 to 12, and set margins to one inch on all sides.
Add clear section headings and bullet points rather than paragraphs.
Avoid graphics, colors, and elaborate templates that waste space or confuse the eye.
A simple, well-organized layout lets your content do the work.
Then, save and submit your resume as a PDF, as this protects your formatting across every device and operating system, so what you see is exactly what the admissions officer sees.
2. Build your sections in the right order
A college admissions resume follows a specific order that puts your most relevant information first.
Start with contact details at the top, then move through education, extracurricular activities, work experience (if you have it), honors and awards, and finally skills and interests.
The education and extracurricular sections carry the most weight for most applicants, so they come early.
Reverse chronological order applies within each section, so list your most recent involvement first, so readers immediately see where you are now, not where you started.
3. Write about impact, not just involvement
The most common weakness on a college admissions resume is describing what you were rather than what you did.
Listing "member of debate club" tells an admissions officer very little.
"Coached five first-year debaters and helped the team qualify for state finals", tells them something real.
For each bullet point, combine an action verb with what you did and a result or scale where possible:
- Led weekly rehearsals for a 30-person choir and organized a fundraiser that raised $2,400 for new equipment
- Founded the school's first environmental club, growing membership to 45 students in one year
- Tutored eight peers in AP Chemistry weekly across junior and senior year
Not every bullet needs a number but specificity always beats vagueness.
4. Tailor, review, and save as a PDF
Before you submit, check that your resume reflects what matters most for the school and program you are applying to.
If you are applying to a music conservatory program, your performance experience should lead.
If you are applying to an engineering program, any coding, robotics, or science competition experience deserves prominence.
Read it out loud and if anything sounds stiff, vague, or exaggerated, rewrite it.
Ask a teacher or counselor to review it and then save as a PDF and check that the formatting holds.
How can I make my college essay stand out to admissions officers?
Your college essay and your resume work as a pair within the same application.
While your resume shows what you have done, your essay explains how you think and who you are becoming.
The two should complement each other rather than repeat the same ground.
- Write in your own voice: An essay that sounds like a real person stands out more than one that sounds polished to the point of being anonymous.
- Focus on you, not your subject: Whether you write about a challenge, a person, or a cause, the essay should centre on your own growth, reflection, and decisions.
- Be specific rather than broad: A concrete moment or observation makes for a more memorable essay than a general statement about values or ambitions.
- Avoid repeating your resume: Use the essay to reveal something that does not appear anywhere else in your application. If you are writing about the same activity you led your resume with, find a different angle or a different story.
- Answer the actual prompt: Read it carefully. A well-written essay that drifts from the question does not serve you.
- Read it out loud before submitting: If a sentence does not sound like something you would say, simplify it.
What should I include in my high school resume for college applications?
A high school resume for college applications should cover six core areas.
Each one tells the admissions committee something different about you.
- Contact information: Your full name, phone number, professional email address, and city and state. Do not include your full street address, photo, date of birth, or social security number.
- Education: Your high school name, expected graduation date, GPA (weighted and unweighted if both are strong), and any relevant test scores such as SAT, ACT, or AP results. You can also list relevant coursework, dual enrollment, or the number of AP and honors classes you have taken.
- Extracurricular activities: This is often the most important section on a college admissions resume. For each activity, include your role, the organization, the years involved, and two to three bullet points describing what you did and the impact it had. Admissions officers value depth and leadership over a long list of passive memberships.
- Work experience: Part-time jobs, internships, freelance work, and family business contributions all belong here. Paid and unpaid roles are both valid. Work experience shows reliability, time management, and responsibility, qualities colleges respect regardless of the industry.
- Honors and awards: List meaningful recognition in reverse order of prestige: national first, then state, regional, and school level. If an award is not widely known, add a brief line of context so the reader understands what it represents.
- Skills and interests: Keep this section concise and genuine. Technical skills, languages, certifications, and specific interests that reflect your character all have a place here. Avoid filler entries like "hardworking" or "Microsoft Word." If an interest is unusual or reveals something distinctive about you, include it.
A common mistake is leaving out activities that feel informal.
Family caregiving responsibilities, part-time work to support your household, or self-directed projects such as building a website or running a YouTube channel are all worth including.
Admissions officers understand that not every student has the same access to traditional extracurriculars, and they are looking for what you did with the time and resources available to you.
What is the difference between a college admissions resume and a job resume?
A college admissions resume is written for an admissions officer.
Its goal is to show who you are as a person and a student, and what kind of contribution you would make to a campus community.
Work experience still matters, but it sits alongside extracurricular activities, academic achievements, volunteer work, and personal interests, all of which carry genuine weight in the admissions process.
The table below shows where the two formats differ most:
| College admissions resume | Job resume | |
|---|---|---|
| Primary audience | Admissions officer | Hiring manager |
| Main purpose | Show character, commitment, and fit | Show skills and professional experience |
| Most important section | Extracurricular activities | Work experience |
| Resume objective | Optional; useful for competitive programs | Common for career changers and entry-level candidates |
| Hobbies and interests | Encouraged if authentic and specific | Usually omitted |
| Length | One page | One page (two for experienced professionals) |
One practical difference worth noting: admissions officers often read hundreds of applications in a short window.
Your resume should be easy to skim and immediately clear.
Every section should earn its place by saying something that could not be inferred from the rest of your application.
Should I include extracurricular activities on my college admissions resume?
Yes, and for most high school students applying to college, the extracurricular activities section is the most important part of the entire resume.
Grades and test scores tell admissions officers what you have achieved academically.
Your activities tell them who you are outside the classroom, how you spend your time, what you care about, and whether you take initiative.
Colleges are not just building a class of high achievers.
They are building a community, and your extracurricular profile is one of the clearest signals of what you would contribute to campus life.
A few principles make this section genuinely strong.
- Depth matters more than volume: A student who has led the same robotics team for three years and grown it from eight members to thirty is a more compelling applicant than one who lists fifteen clubs with no meaningful role in any of them. Admissions officers consistently say they would rather see sustained commitment to a few things than surface-level involvement in many.
- Leadership and initiative carry real weight: Holding a formal title helps, but it is not the only way to demonstrate leadership. Organizing an event, mentoring younger members, starting something new, or taking on a responsibility nobody asked you to take are all forms of initiative that admissions officers notice.
- Informal activities count: Not every student has access to a wide range of school clubs or competitive programs. Caring for siblings, contributing to a family business, teaching yourself a skill, or building something independently are all valid and worth including. Admissions officers understand that opportunity is not equally distributed, and they are looking at what you did with what you had.
- Include the time commitment where it adds context: If you spent 20 hours a week on a part-time job alongside your studies, saying so helps the admissions officer understand what your schedule actually looked like and why your other involvement may be narrower than another applicant's.
For each activity, write one to three bullet points using the action verb plus result format.
Aim to show what changed or what you built, not just what you attended.
Does a college application resume need to be one page?
A college admissions resume should be one page long, and this applies to almost every applicant regardless of how much you have been involved in.
One page is the standard because your resume is meant to complement your application, not expand it, and admissions officers are reading hundreds of documents in a short window.
If you cannot fit your strongest experiences onto one page, the issue is usually that you are including too much, not that you need more space.
Prioritize depth over volume, and focus on writing about your most meaningful involvement in specific, impactful terms rather than listing everything you have ever done.
What are the best tips for writing a compelling college application resume?
A compelling college application resume is specific, honest, and easy to read.
The tips below cover the decisions that make the biggest difference between a resume that blends in and one that gives an admissions officer a clear picture of who you are.
| Tip | What it means in practice |
|---|---|
| Use action verbs | Start every bullet with a verb that reflects a real decision: led, founded, coached, designed, organized, published. Avoid "helped with" or "was involved in." |
| Quantify your impact | Add numbers where you can. How many people? How many hours? How much raised? Specific figures give admissions officers something concrete to remember. |
| Prioritize depth over breadth | Two or three activities you committed to seriously are more persuasive than fifteen you attended occasionally. Show what sustained involvement looks like for you. |
| Tailor to your intended program | Put the experiences most relevant to your chosen field of study higher on the page. Admissions readers in specific programs look for genuine interest in the subject. |
| Keep formatting clean | One page, consistent fonts, clear section headings, and bullet points. Nothing decorative that distracts from the content. |
| Be honest and specific | Accurate, detailed descriptions of what you actually did are always more convincing than inflated titles or vague claims. Admissions officers read thousands of resumes and can spot exaggeration. |
| Save as a PDF | This protects your formatting across every device. What you see when you save it is exactly what the admissions officer sees when they open it. |
Should I submit a resume with my college application?
Whether to submit a resume depends on the college, so check each school's guidance before you decide.
Some colleges actively encourage a separate resume, others have no mechanism to accept one, and a small number specifically ask you not to include additional materials.
When a school does allow it, submitting a well-prepared resume is generally worthwhile, particularly if you have experiences that do not fit neatly into the structured fields of an application form.
One practical reason to prepare a resume regardless of college requirements is that many teachers and counselors ask students for one before writing a recommendation letter, and having an up-to-date document on hand makes it easier for them to write something specific and strong on your behalf.
Are there any common mistakes to avoid when preparing college application materials?
Avoiding these errors will make your resume more credible, easier to read, and more useful to the admissions officer reviewing it.
- Repeating your Activities List word for word: Your resume should add detail and context, not duplicate what is already in your application. If the content is identical, the resume adds no value.
- Including every activity regardless of relevance or depth: A long list of brief memberships looks thin. Be selective. Include the activities where you contributed most, held a real role, or showed sustained involvement.
- Using vague, passive descriptions: Phrases like "helped with," "participated in," and "was involved in" do not tell an admissions officer anything meaningful. Replace them with active, specific language that describes what you actually did.
- Listing middle school activities: Unless an achievement from middle school is truly exceptional, such as a national-level recognition, it should not be on your resume. Admissions officers are interested in who you are now.
- Ignoring formatting consistency: Inconsistent fonts, uneven spacing, or misaligned bullet points signal carelessness. The formatting of your resume reflects how much attention you pay to detail, which is something admissions officers notice.
- Submitting a Word document instead of a PDF: Word files can look very different depending on the device or software used to open them. Always save and submit as a PDF.
- Exaggerating roles or accomplishments: Overstating your involvement is a risk that is not worth taking. Admissions officers read thousands of resumes and speak to teachers, counselors, and recommendation writers who know you. Accuracy and honesty are always the stronger choice.
If you prefer to follow along visually, our step-by-step video guide walks you through how to write a college admissions resume from start to finish.
Frequently asked questions
A few more questions come up regularly when students are preparing their college application resume.
Should I submit my resume to colleges?
Yes and no, check each college's guidance before submitting.
Some schools welcome a resume, others have no mechanism to accept one, and a small number specifically ask you not to include additional materials.
When a school does allow it, a well-prepared resume is worth submitting, especially if you have experiences that need more context than the application form allows.
Are there specific templates for college admissions resumes?
Yes, the best templates for this purpose are clean and minimal, with clear section headings, consistent formatting, and enough white space to be easy to read.
Avoid templates with graphics, columns, or decorative elements that can confuse application portals when uploaded as a PDF.
Can I include middle school activities on my college resume?
In almost all cases, no.
Admissions officers are focused on who you are during high school.
The exception would be a truly exceptional achievement, such as a national award or a creative or athletic accomplishment with documented recognition.
If you are unsure, leave it out.
Do I need work experience on my college admission resume?
No, work experience is one section of a college admissions resume, not a requirement.
If you have not held a paid or formal job, focus your resume on your extracurricular activities, volunteer work, personal projects, and any informal responsibilities such as caring for siblings or contributing to a family business.
Admissions officers understand that access to formal work experience varies considerably across different backgrounds.
Do I need a college admissions resume if I have a strong application?
A strong application does not make a resume unnecessary.
A well-prepared resume can strengthen a strong application further by presenting your background in a clear, organized format that is easy to review quickly.
It also gives context to experiences that may not fit neatly into structured application fields.
Think of it as an additional tool, not a substitute for anything else in your application.
