Should You List Major And Minor On Your Resume
There are several reasons you should list your college major and minor on your resume. If you are a current student, recent graduate, or a candidate with limited relevant work experience, including a detailed education section in your resume can help your resume stand out. If you are a professional with a significant amount of experience, you can still list your major and minor on your resume to highlight expanded knowledge in your field.
However, while you should typically include your major, consider whether your minor is relevant to the job. It may be better to omit the minor if it has no relation to your career.
Should You Mention An Incomplete Degree On Your Resume
We have worked with several executives who do not hold a college degree or who started a post-graduate degree and never completed it.
If you are in a similar position, rest assured that an incomplete degree is not a deal-breaker if you have relevant professional experience.
In this article, we explain how to present your incomplete degree in a way that builds your credibility while avoiding red flags.
We also provide an example of an effective way to do so.
How To List A College Degree On Resume
If you’ve completed your degree and are wondering how to showcase your college education on resume, simply follow the following format:
- The name of your degree
- Your major/minor
- The name of the institution/university
- Location of your institution
- Commencement and completion date
Take a look at the following sample of the education section in a resume:
Given below are some of the dos and don’ts you must follow while listing education, including unfinished degrees on resume:
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Ensure that you put your highest degree at the top, followed by your older degrees.
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If you are a working professional with ample work experience, consider eliminating details about your high school while listing education on resume.
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If you choose to use an abbreviation while listing your degree, like “MSc.” instead of “Master’s of Science”, ensure follow the same approach while listing other degrees as well, to maintain uniformity. The same rule applies when you are writing the location as well.
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You can rearrange the information according to its relevance while listing your education. Meaning, if your degree is not related to the job profile you’re applying for, you can put the university name before your degree.
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Resume Vs Curriculum Vitae
If youâre applying for a PhD or research program or a job in academia, you may be asked to submit a curriculum vitae, or CV, instead of a resume. If this is the case, your education section should come before your work experience. CVs are generally longer than resumes, so you can include your complete academic history, including all certifications and achievements.
What Do You Want A Recruiter To Know About Your Studies
Let’s start here. Ask yourself what you want to communicate about your education. Set aside the idea that you HAVE to have an education section on your resume. Since you, I assume, haven’t completed a degree program, what do you want the recruiter to know? If it’s simply that you have taken some general education classes, why is that important? I’m going to guess it’s because you feel like you need something in the education section. Stop. It’s not true.
Adding general education classes to your resume isn’t going to get you any closer to the job. Unless your classes are directly related to your desired position, what you are going to be communicating to a recruiter is that you started something and didn’t finish.
I started taking classes toward an MBA through a program that gave you automatic admission when you took four specific classes and got all A’s. Know what I did? I took my classes, got my As, and never went back. Sometimes quitting something is the right decision. That whole MBA situation does not appear on my resume because employers wouldn’t care that I took even more statistics in macroeconomics classes on top of what I did as an undergrad. I started that program because I didn’t like where I was professionally and I needed to feel like I was doing something to get out. Changing jobs and acknowledging that I didn’t need the MBA took care of that
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Consider Adding Additional Sections
Adding additional non-work-related sections after the skills section on your college resume can help you stand out from other applicants with similar educational backgrounds and skill sets.
Here are some examples of sections you could add to the end of your resume:
An activities section is ideal for students or recent grads who have limited to no prior work experience. Listing relevant activities gives you the chance to show where and how you developed certain skills outside your education. Just make sure your activities reflect the type of work you’ll be doing in the position you’re applying for.
You’ll want to list any academic-related honors and awards you’ve received in your education section. If you’ve earned any honors outside your college experience that are relevant to the job, you can create a separate section that briefly explains the significance of each award.
If you’ve received any training and/or certifications that prove you have specific skills or knowledge relevant to the position, put these in a separate section.
Those applying for a job that requires experience with specific software, digital tools, or web languages should include a digital proficiency section at the end of their resume to prove they’re technologically qualified. You could also include this section in place of a standard skills section if digital proficiencies are more relevant to the role.
Should I Put In An Incomplete Degree On A Resume
Oh no, what are they going to think
Thats probably the first thing that runs through your head when you think about putting your incomplete degree on your resume.
Breathe, its okay. In fact, 40% of college students drop out before having the chance to graduate. In many cases, including your incomplete degree in your resume can only work in your favor.
Just make sure you format it correctly and professionally, and the recruiters will hire you right away.
Stay with us and you will find out how to include your unfinished degree on your resume when you:
- Have a large gap in your employment history
- Are currently pursuing your degree
- Are not going to finish your education
As well as whether you should ever leave an unfinished degree off your resume.
One more hint from us: If youre not quite sure how to structure your resume, you should check out our Resume Examples and Resume Templates and use them to build your resume in no time.
So lets dive in and get your unfinished degree working for you.
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What If Your Degree Is Not Related To Your Job
I know someone who graduated with a degree in design that is nowworking as a life insurance agent, and I know a nursing graduate who worked inIT for years, before becoming a real estate agent. This happens more than youknow, so you shouldnt let this stop you from chasing after your dream job.
Below are two ways to downplay the lack of formal education inyour target job:
- List the relevant coursework in your degree.Lets say you have a Psychology degree, but want a job in marketing. If youtook units in social psychology, communications, grammar, and business, thosesubjects show you have the knowledge required for the job.
- List professional courses or ongoing trainingyou took to compensate for your lack of formal schooling on the subject.
The Sections Of The Project Execution Plan
man in blue long sleeve shirt holding smartphonePhoto by airfocus on Unsplash
PEPs need to be thorough yet easy enough to navigate or people will not use them. I typically divide mine into four top-level sections:
1. Scope and Purpose
These plans give the top-level view as to the purpose of the project, as well as the list of scoped deliverables, key delivery dates, and a procedure on processing changes that always seem to occur on projects, even the ones with so-called mature part numbers. This is the one section where you normally must have sign-off to not only green-light the project, but also agreed scope and delivery targets which then become the baseline for management by the project team.
2. Financials
In this section, the detailed project budget will be included along with the detailed costs which were calculated prior to project green-lighting. Guidance regarding the ways in which scope items or component parts thereof will be provided in accordance with corporate directives, industry norms, and regulatory requirements. Customer financial milestones or progress billings will be listed along with the supporting documentation required for invoicing and payment so as to allow for proper calculation and monitoring of the project cash flow.
3. Communications
4. Risk and Quality
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Tips For Writing A College Resume
Read below for tips on how to write a strong college resume.
- Use action verbs. Action verbs help show your responsibility. When describing your achievements, use action words. Words like led, researched, and to portray your experiences in an energetic way. Check out a list of action words for useful examples.
- Quantify when possible. Whenever possible, include numbers to show your achievements. For example, you might say that you worked the cash register at a store that managed $10,000 daily, or that you helped 50 – 100 customers daily at your retail job.
Keep A Few Other Tried
Here are a few other parting tips to keep in mind as you build your document:
- Avoid writing in first person .
- Bullet points will make your document more readableusually two to three per entry works well. But it doesnt have to be even: Give more description space to the most relevant entries.
- Attention to detail matters. Proofreadnot just for typos, but to make sure formatting is consistent . Employers will use your resume to make assumptions about how detail-oriented you are.
- Review any headers you put in all caps. Some spell checkers are programmed to assume that theyre acronyms and skip them.
- Ditch jargon and acronyms wherever possible. Dont assume the reader always knows what youre talking about. Sometimes the first person reading your document is a general recruiter and not familiar with the technical side of a role.
- Be aware of tenses. If youve completed an experience, those descriptions will be in past tense, and current roles can be described in present tense.
- Acceptable margins are usually between one and 0.7 inches.
- Pick a readable font, like Arial, Calibri, or Times New Roman, and try not to go below font size 11.
- As a college student, stick to a one-page resume. However, you should consider keeping a longer version for your own personal use. Thats where you keep a full record of your experiences to make it easier to pull out the relevant ones each time you tailor your resume for a specific job.
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Keep The Focus On Your Accomplishments And Experience
In the chronological resume format, the Work Experience section comes first. Thus, youll have plenty of room to make a solid impression before the HR scans to the bottom education part. Make this section the focal point of your resume. Speak to your accomplishments at every position you have held, quantifying them with relevant numbers whenever possible. Showcase that you have solid hard and soft skills, highly relevant to the announced position. Prove that you are a solid performer that can bring a tangible impact to the new organization.
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Where To Include Education On A Resume
When it comes to placing your educational credentials on a resume, there are many considerations to make.
Resumes can serve a variety of purposes and, as a general rule of thumb, should be tailored for specific jobs.
It is also important to take into consideration the level of education you have completed, as this will impact how it should be presented as well.
For instance, a job applicant seeking a position in academia would have a much heavier emphasis on education and academic-related achievements â than someone seeking a job in a corporate environment.
Ultimately, not all resumes are the same, so the placement of the education section will differ depending on the type of resume being used and the intention behind its structuring.
How To List Unfinished Degree On Resume In 202: With 10+ Examples
Should you put an unfinished degree on your resume?
For most cases, yes, you should include an unfinished degree on resume if the job profile you are targeting calls for it.
Its only natural to worry about how the recruiters are going to perceive your unfinished degree on resume.
However, studies show that 40% of undergraduate college students do not complete their graduation. So its really about how you present it, rather than what you say.
Besides, depending on your situation, you might consider going back to school to complete your degree in the near future or you might have had serious reasons for not being able to complete college.
Whatever may be the reason, the key is to present your unfinished degree on resume in a positive light.
Read on to see an unfinished degree on resume examples and get clarity on the following FAQs:
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Be Transparent About What You Studied
You shouldnt list Bachelor of Arts in English on your resume, for example, if you did not earn the degree.
Recruiters perceive such an approach to be misleading, which could significantly harm your chances of landing a job.
However, there is an easy way to approach this situation by adding coursework toward in front of the degree you were pursuing.
Where To Place Your Education Section
Where you place the education section on your resume depends on a few different factors: your education history, your work history, and the job for which you are applying.
If you are a recent graduate with minimal work history, itâs appropriate to list your education first. Education will be your more impressive section, and youâll want it to be the first seen when employers are viewing your application.
If you are pursuing a job that requires a particular degree or credential, you should also list your education first. Employers will be interested in making sure you have those certifications before moving forward with your resume.
If youâve been working for several years, your work history is likely more relevant than your education history, so it may make sense to list it first. This is particularly true if the field of study of our degree isnât particularly relevant to the job or industry youâre targeting.
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Stick With Action Verbs
Many resumes are littered with the same trite words, which is why you should make an effort to switch up common words and phrases with stronger action verbs. This is especially important when writing the first word for each bullet point in your work experience section, as you want to immediately catch the hiring manager’s attention.
Use verbs such as “converted,” “analyzed,” and “composed” to portray your achievements in a more engaging manner. You might even consider using a thesaurus to help you find stronger synonyms for common words, or referring to this list of action verbs created by Harvard.
When Should You Include An Unfinished College Degree On Your Resume
Dont focus on whether or not your degree is finished, but rather put your attention on some more important questions:
Remember: if your degree does not match the position youre applying for at all, you should consider leaving it out of your resume.
But dont forget mentioning your unfinished degree can also avoid awkward questions during the interview. Also, adding it avoids negative assumptions that stop the Hiring manager from considering you for the position.
What are the different scenarios, you wonder?
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Where To Position Education On Your Resume
So, should your education or experience come first in your resume?
Think of it this way:
The top third of the resume is reserved for your accomplishments that are most relevant to the job you are applying for.
So before you continue, ask yourself: Is your education your most relevant accomplishment?
The answer most of the time will be no. Work experience will be a more important requirement for just about any position above entry-level.
However, education can take priority in some particular cases.
Education comes first if youve just graduated from college and dont have relevant work experience to list. Imagine you are an employer and the first thing you see in someones resume when theyre applying for an entry-level marketing associate position is their summer job as a bodyguard at their local town pool.
Its also wise to list education before work experience if youve recently gotten back to school to get a degree thats relevant to your potential job.
For example, if youre switching to a career in sustainable energy after having finished a related program, but have work experience predominantly in engineering, you would want your new education to be the first thing the hiring manager sees.
Getting a fresh MSc, Ph.D., or MBA is another case where you would want to highlight those degrees more than the work experience.
Not sure if you need a CV or a resume? Check out our guide on CV vs Resume and learn whats the difference between the two .