Resume Pointers for Scholars
Your resume is a professional summary of your education at UMD, skills, experiences, and accomplishments tailored to secure an interview, internship, or job. Utilize it as a strategic document that communicates to an employer the transferable qualities and skills that make you the best fit for the position.
Marketing Scholars on Your Resume
Always search for ways to include College Park Scholars on your resume, as many components of your being selected to be part of your program are selling points. Similar to Scholars, companies are organizations, and employers will be able to relate what you accomplished in your program to the type of employee you might be during your internship/at their company.
You can enhance your resume by highlighting your participation in philanthropic events like Service Day or other service-learning opportunities, experience organizing events for your program, being involved with your program's social media team, Lakeland STARs, Peer Mentors, or Student Advisory Board (SAB), or your ability to present ideas during colloquium or your capstone at Academic Showcase.
Remember to quantify your Scholars experiences, to the best of your ability. When discussing your experience in Scholars, give concrete, quantifiable details to provide your future employers with a better idea of what you did and how often you did it. These numbers give your experience(s) more relevance to the company, especially if the activity you are sharing about is in line with the company's goals and values.
Consider:
- How many:
- People attended the events hosted by your program? Number of participants at the Academic Showcase overall? People working together as a team for a project? Hours put into planning an event?
- How often:
- Did you speak in public (beyond a classroom setting)? Attend meetings? Volunteer? Plan events?
How to Include Scholars on Your Resume
We highly recommend that students include College Park Scholars on their resumes. Due to its highly selective, invitation-only admission practices, it already sets you apart from other applicants. Additionally, our 13 programs
As you begin explore polishing your resume, here are some additional things to consider:
✅: Refer to your unit, program, and/or college by its full name on the first reference. Subsequent references may use approved abbreviations or a workaround preceded by “the”: center, institute, office, school, college.
- Media, Self and Society Scholars
- College of Information
✅: Use initial uppercase letters only for the full, official name as a proper noun. Do not capitalize when used in a descriptive manner.
- Do: the university, 🚫 Don't: the University
🚫: Try to avoid the use of ampersands or plus signs in place of “and” in text or headline titles, even for official UMD unit names.
- Business, Society & Entrepreneurship
- Environment, Technology & the Environment
🚫: Avoid speaking in first person. Do not use personal pronouns such as “me” or “I.”
🚫: Skip adding personal details. Since it is illegal for a company to solicit a candidate’s age, race, or marital status during the hiring process, many will just toss your resume.
🚫: Avoid using pre-formatted templates. Your document should look balanced, be pleasing to the eye, and easy to read for both people and scanners.
🚫: Don't use fancy fonts. Avoid using serif fonts (Times New Roman or Georgia) because they have small lines and tails on the ends of most letters. Use sans-serif fonts (Arial, Verdana, Trebuchet, Century Gothic, or Tahoma) because they do not have these little lines, appear blockier and are easier to read by screening programs. The body text of your resume should not be too small (no less than 10 pt.) or too large (no more than 12 pt.). Never use more than 2 fonts (section titles, section information).
🤔: Including scholarships and awards received during your time in College Park Scholars. If you submitted an application to be selected, this is an opportunity to brag about being one of the best of the best in a highly competitive field of applicants.
🤔: Limiting information included. A resume is a marketing tool, not a complete job history. Include only the items that will help you get the job you want. Target your resume to a specific position or industry.
🤔: Adding relevant coursework and/or labs. Listing courses that are most impressive to the employer and relevant to your future role (particularly useful when applying for internships, co-ops or graduate school) may be added.
Quick Resume Checklist
✅ Individually tailor your resume to fit EACH job you are applying for.
✅ Double-check for spelling, grammar, or punctuation mistakes.
✅ Make sure to use only professional contact information (email, LinkedIn, etc.). Omit your home address.
✅ Do not utilize personal pronouns such as I, my, or me.
✅ Do not falsify information or use AI to craft your resume. Using AI to add depth, warmth, or to make your own words more concise is an acceptable use.
✅ Continue to update your resume as you gain more experience.
✅ Make sure that you use concise, professional, and easy-to-read language.