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6 Tips for Your College Application Resume

Your resume will be an important part of your career life, serving as a catalog of your professional accomplishments, experience, and achievements. But even before you’re a full-fledged working adult, it’s still a good idea to start building your resume.

Many high school students use this space to record and describe their accomplishments, such as awards, volunteer and paid work, prestigious program participation, and more.

So, if you’ve taken the time to create a resume, can you submit it to colleges to augment your application? In some cases, yes. Keep reading to find out how to craft the ideal resume for colleges.

Which Schools Allow You to Submit Your Resume?

The schools allow you to submit your resume via the Common Application. This list is not exhaustive; it includes the top 20 universities and liberal arts colleges that allow you to do so.

•     Brown University
•     Claremont McKenna College
•     Cornell University
•     Dartmouth College
•     Johns Hopkins University
•     Northwestern University
•     University of Pennsylvania
•     Vanderbilt University
•     Vassar College
•     Washington and Lee University
•     Washington University in St. Louis

Should You Submit Your Resume?

It’s a good idea to submit your resume if there is important information you’re unable to include on the rest of your application, such as professional experiences or special projects.

If you don’t have something new to say, then you shouldn’t include a resume. That is, you shouldn’t regurgitate information the adcom can find elsewhere on your application. You can, however, use it as a space to expand on or illustrate accomplishments if you don’t feel you’ve been able to in the activities section or your essays.

How to Write a Resume for College Applications

1. include information you feel isn’t represented elsewhere..

As you’ll find in your career, not every experience relates to the opportunity you have at hand. When you enter the job market, you’ll learn to tailor your resume to specific positions based on how your work history relates to them. This is true of your college applications, too. For each experience you include, consider how it bolsters your overall profile — and only add the ones that do to your resume.

First, here’s the essential info you should include on your resume:

• Name and email address (no need to include your actual address)
• Education/high school info, like your GPA and test scores 

Other info you may include:

• Special projects related to your interests (if you’re a writer, this could be a list of pieces you’ve written with a description, or if you’re a programmer, you could also describe your projects).
• Publications (scientific, literary, etc.)
• Non-traditional coursework or academic activities (legitimate online certificates/courses, academic programs, etc.)
• Extracurriculars, hobbies, and skills and interests
• Professional and work experience
• Family responsibilities

2. Don’t rehash your activities section.

Again, don’t use this space to regurgitate information you’ve presented elsewhere on your application. Instead, it should be a space to share unique facets of yourself that don’t fit into other places.

For example, perhaps there’s a specific job you held that you couldn’t properly describe in the activities section. You can use this space to elaborate on the responsibilities you held. Or, as mentioned in the previous section, you can describe specific projects you’ve completed related to your interests. This is especially helpful for more self-driven pursuits, like independent writing.

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3. Keep it brief (one page) and easy to read.

Your resume should be concise. Since you probably haven’t accumulated a significant amount of experience as a teenager, you should keep it to one page (if you’re an adult student, that’s a different story). At the same time, avoid using teensy font and ultra-slim margins to cram everything into a single page — the resume should be easy to scan and read. Remember: be selective to ensure you have enough room.

Part of making your resume readable means formatting it such that it’s presentable. Use space to your advantages, along with a clear system for organizing the information; the traditional format is chronological, but you may choose to use an alternative format instead. Use headings, too, and make sure your formatting is consistent throughout.

4. Use active and specific language.

Use the active voice when cataloging your achievements. You should also be offering clear evidence. If you can, use numbers and facts to support your experiences.

For example, rather than saying, “Started tutoring business,” you might instead write, “Built a tutoring business by recruiting 15 student tutors and initiating a social media campaign targeting students in need of STEM support; personally worked with 25 students, who improved their GPAs by an average of X points.”

5. Talk yourself up, but don’t be dishonest or unreasonable.

Some students are eager to share their accomplishments. If you’re ever going to talk yourself up, this is the time to do it. You can’t be shy or reluctant to, well, brag a little. Other students will be talking themselves up, and you don’t want it to appear as though you don’t have anything to show for yourself.

At the same time, be careful of hyperbolizing your achievements. Colleges can easily verify the facts on your resume. If your accomplishments seem unfathomable, it will raise a red flag. This will lead colleges to question other aspects of your application, too.

Just as you should with the rest of your application, you’ll need to proofread your resume many times to catch any errors or typos. You should also read it over for clarity and to ensure that it’s as concise as it can be.

If you can, get another set of eyes on your resume before you upload it to your application. A peer, teacher, or guidance counselor can help you make sure your achievements are coming across the way you want them to and that you’re presenting yourself authentically.

Looking for more general guidance on the college application process? CollegeVine is here to make it as seamless as possible. Our free platform allows you to see your chances of acceptance, get essay feedback from peers, and hear from experts in daily livestreams. Sign up for your free CollegeVine account to get started.

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College Application Resume for 2024 [With Examples, Tips & Template]

They say college is the most exciting time in a student’s life and we couldn’t agree more! 

The only thing standing between you and your dream university, though, is a college application resume.

You open the resume document, get ready to start writing…

And nothing comes out! After all, how can you even make a resume when you haven’t worked a day in your life?

Worry not - you don’t need any work experience to write a compelling college application resume. In this article, we’re going to teach you just how you can do that!

What Should a Resume for College Application Contain?

• 5+ College Application Resume Formatting Tips
• How to Write a Resume for College Applications?
• 3+ College Application Resume Tips

College Application Resume Template

So let’s dive in! 

Before we get into the knits and grits of writing a resume for college application, let’s first do a quick review of what your resume should contain: 

• Contact information , including your full name, address, phone number, and professional email.
• A resume objective , where you state the goal of your college application resume.
• Education section , where you list the history of your grades and exam scores.
• Relevant activities , including any work experience you might have.
• Skills relevant to a resume for a college application, e.g. soft skills such as active listening, interpersonal skills, communication skills, or hard skills such as public speaking, MS Office, or computer skills.
• Additional sections , such as awards and honors.

6 College Application Resume Formatting Tips 

Before we dive into the nits and grits of CV making, let’s talk about formatting. Here are our top tips on how to format your college application resume: 

• Choose the functional/skills-based resume format. This format is perfect for those who lack work experience , as it focuses more on your skill-set. If you DO have some work experience, though, then you can opt for the chronological format.
• Keep your college application resume one page long . As a rule of thumb, this is the optimal length for a resume—professionals with 10 years worth of work experience stick to the 1-page limit, so there’s no excuse for someone with little to no work experience to go overboard.
• Add plenty of white space , especially around your resume’s margins. It will make your resume look less cluttered and more reader-friendly.
• Include clear section headings and use the same heading for each section.
• Use an easy-to-read font. Some resume fonts (such as Ubuntu or Overpass) are resume friendly—professional-looking, easy-to-read, and yet modern. Others, like Comic Sans, are just one big NO.
• Save your college resume as a PDF. You might be used to Microsoft Word, or even think it’s the safest alternative, but MS Word has a good choice of messing up your resume format if opened in different computers or operating systems. PDF files, on the other hand, remain the same no matter what computer opens them.

How to Write a Resume for College Applications? (With Examples)

Once you’ve got the formatting done right, it’s time to get to writing your college application resume.

In this section, we’ll walk you through that process, starting with:  

#1. Order Your Contact Information the Right Way 

As we already mentioned, your college application resume should start with your contact information. 

These are your contact information section must-haves :

• Full name and address
• Functional phone number where you can be reached.
• Professional email address, preferably consisting of your first and last name.

And here’s what this looks like in practice: 

Sharon White

123 Main Street

New York, NY

Phone Number: 553-123-1234

Email: [email protected]

#2. Write an Attention-Grabbing College Resume Objective

A resume objective is a 2-3 sentence long paragraph that should communicate your motivation for getting into college or for studying a specific major.

As such, a well-crafted resume objective can instantly attract admission officers to read the rest of your college application resume. 

There is, however, a right and wrong way to write a resume objective.

A convincing resume objective is:

• Tailored to the university/major you’re applying to, instead of looking like a one-fits-all kind of statement that you can use to apply to several colleges.
• Highlights the achievements that give you an edge over the competition.  

The following example does that right: 

Aspiring journalist with a knack for creative writing looking to deepen their knowledge through NYU’s renowned Journalism track. Founder of my high school’s first online newspaper, the ‘Daily Prophet,’ which now has over 2,000 subscribers. Hardworking, with a grade A average in social sciences and commitment to improving. 

Now compare it to the following resume objective, which although articulated looks like a one-fits-all kind of statement that you can just insert into several college applications. 

Very committed high-schooler with a calling for social sciences. With an SAT score of 1400, a passion for psychology, and experience as a peer counselor, I am confident that my hard work and motivation will shine through as a college student. 

See, the resume objective is your chance to show exactly why you want to attend that college, right from the start. 

So, even if you don’t have many achievements to highlight, make sure to personalize your statement by expressing a genuine interest in your application.  

#3. Put Weight on Your Education

Taking into consideration that, as a student, you most likely lack significant work experience, your education is the first thing admission officers will look at. 

As such, you should give your education its due importance in your college application resume. 

For starters, make sure to include this must-have information:

• Your high school’s name and location
• The date of your graduation

In addition, though, combine that with some relevant achievements that can make your education pop out. 

Let’s take a look at two examples. The second student has simply listed out the essential education information, whereas the first has taken their education section to the next level. 

Dunnellon High School FL

2017 - 2021

• 3rd place at the International Mathematical Olympiad 
• Vice-President of the Science Club
• SAT Scores: 1350 (650 Verbal, 700 Math)
• SAT Scores: 1400

#4. Showcase Relevant Activities

Extracurricular activities have a great number of benefits when it comes to your college application resume. Most importantly, they:

• Demonstrate you who are outside of the classroom
• Provide an opportunity to showcase your skills

Any activity and/or interest related to the college you’re applying to has a place on your college application resume,  but you don’t have to necessarily stop there. 

Any kind of interest, field, or activity where you’re good at can be of benefit to your application. 

That’s because it can prove that your interests are not focused solely on your favorite subject or desired career path and that you are engaged and well-rounded . 

So, don’t just list your college resume activities dryly (e.g. “reading” or “swimming”). Instead, be specific and creative about your interests, and rest assured that you will get extra points for diversity and commitment. 

Don’t believe us? Compare for yourself how the activities sections of two different students look like: the first has put minimal effort into it, whereas the second has put his A-game into writing it.

• Passionate about science
• Co-founder of the Astrophysics Club

Activities 

• Two-times winner of my high school’s Science Fair
• Co-founder of the Astrophysics Club, finalists of the MIT-founded THINK challenge
• Swimmer from an early age and member of my high school’s swim team during junior and senior year 
• Traveling; I have so far visited 10 countries and 15 states in the USA. 
• Photography, with a focus on architectural photography. 

#5. Highlight Your Work Experience

Now, if you’ve spent your summer holidays working any type of job for teens , that means that you also have some work experience under your belt. 

Although work experience is not necessary when you’re applying for college (meaning that you won’t get left out of college if you don’t have any), it does help to include it if you have it. 

Here’s how to list work experience in your college application resume:

• Start with the company name (e.g. if you worked at Starbucks), your job title, and the period you worked there. 
• Put your job title first if you worked, say, as a high-school tutor or camp counselor. 
• Include 1-2 of your main responsibilities in bullets. If you have achievements to show for, however, make sure to put them first.  

Let’s see how that works in a practical example.

Starbucks Coffee 

• Awarded employee of the month for 3 months straight
• Fielding customer complaints and questions
• Maintaining good customer service and speedy delivery

Even if the above position isn’t related to the student’s desired field of study, the work experience still highlights some of their skills such as commitment, time management, effective communication, and motivation.  

#6. Include Your Skills 

Skills—we all got them, but not everyone knows how to demonstrate them effectively in a college application resume. 

There are two things to consider when you include skills in your college resume:

• Know the kind of skills that are relevant to your major/field.
• Prove your skills, instead of just listing them 

Let’s show you how that works through practical examples:

• Time management
• Critical thinking

Are these great skills for a college applicant? Sure! 

But anyone can claim to have those skills (and frankly, most people do).

Rather than just listing these skills, you want to also back them up with achievements and experiences like so: 

• Attention to deadline: managed to update the high school’s online newspaper daily
• Leadership: successfully led a team of 6 reporters.
• Creativity: won the 2021 Young Writers competition 
• Self-motivation: founded the high school’s first online newspaper

Now, this is a skills section on a college application resume that proves you deserve a spot in your favorite university.

College application resume skills 

Wondering which skills to include in your college application resume? Here’s a list to draw some inspiration: 

Soft Skills

• Good judgment 
• Open-mindedness
• Communication  
• Self-motivation
• Interpersonal skills
• Active listening
• Problem-solving

Hard Skills

• Computer Skills
• Programming
• Public Speaking

#7. Use These Additional Sections

If you’ve followed all our tips till now, congrats - you’re around 90% into creating a top-notch college application resume.

Now, let’s talk about how you can take that to 100%!

In addition to the conventional resume sections we’ve covered till now, you can include the following to help you stand out in a sea of other applicants:

• Awards. Here, you can list any awards won in competitions (spelling, art, storytelling, math, etc). 
• Volunteer experience . Did you clean up your town, or maybe you volunteered at an animal rescue center as a high school student? Any kind of volunteering can help your college application resume because it shows you’re a responsible community member. If it’s somehow related to your field or future major, that’s a big plus. 
• Projects. Be them individual (e.g. you built a website from scratch, or started an informational podcast), or school-related (e.g. an art portfolio for a class, or a history documentary), projects can show that you’re passionate and creative. 
• Sports. Poet Juvenal said “ a healthy mind in a healthy body. ” This means that physical exercise is an important part of mental and psychological well-being (which is why sports in a college application resume make all applicants look good). Do you excel at specific sports? Include them in your resume!. 
• Languages. Being fluent (or even just a beginner) in a foreign language is another plus for a prospective college student. Make sure to show it in your college application resume. 

5 College Application Resume Tips

Finally, here are some of our college application tips that didn’t fit anywhere else in the article:

• Be direct and to the point. Your college application resume is not the right place to show how many SAT-level words you know. Keep your language simple, direct, and to the point. Let your achievements and results speak for themselves. 
• Don't lie about your academic background or accomplishments. Lying about the awards you’ve won or your achievements won’t get you into college. More often than not, admission officers will see through your lies by asking behavioral interview questions . 
• Proofread your college application resume.   Spelling and grammar mistakes can make you appear like a less serious applicant. Imagine telling recruiters that you have great SAT scores and GPA but having spelling mistakes in your resume. Kind of contradictory, isn’t it? To avoid these kinds of mistakes, use spelling and grammar apps such as Grammarly and Heminway . 
• Have one or more people look at your resume before you send it out. There are kinds of mistakes that Grammarly or Hemingway cannot catch. To avoid such mistakes, have one or more people that know you give your college application resume a look. 
• Emphasize specific achievements over general responsibilities. As mentioned before, emphasizing your achievements over your responsibilities is the best way to set yourself apart from other candidates. The reason is that your achievements effectively show how well you handle responsibilities and they are uniquely yours.

Making a resume from scratch can take what feels like ages—especially if it’s your first time doing it.

You’ve got to tweak the formatting. 

You make a change at MS Word and the layout falls apart in front of your eyes. Or you end up using a bland and outdated template. 

Well, you don’t have to worry about any of these things with Nóvóresume’s free resume templates . 

With 8 free templates to choose from - college application resume included - you don’t have to worry about anything other than inputting your information.

Let our resume builder do the rest! 

Key Takeaways

And that’s a wrap on college application resumes. We hope to have made the process of writing yours easier and even more enjoyable. 

For good measure, let’s go over the main points we covered: 

• Your college application resume should contain the following sections: contact information , personal profile , education section , relevant activities , your skills , and additional sections , such as awards and honors. 
• In terms of formatting, the functional resume template fits your college application best. Additionally, make sure to keep your resume one page long and save it as a PDF. 
• Write a resume objective that doesn’t surpass 3 sentences and that clearly communicates your motivation for getting into college and your most relevant skills. 
• Make sure to give your education section its due importance by being thorough about your grades, SAT scores, and achievements. 
• Don’t forget to list all your relevant activities and passions, as well as soft and hard skills.
• Instead of writing your college application resume from scratch, use one of Nóvóresume’s ready-made templates to save yourself time and effort!  

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Do I Need a Resume for My College Applications?

July 21, 2021

If you are a teenage prodigy who spent your spare time in high school interning at a cancer research laboratory and founding a charitable organization which distributes prescription glasses in Zimbabwe, then being asked to formulate a resume as part of your college application might sound like a perfectly natural proposition. It’s quite easy to summarize your prodigious achievements in resume form if you happen to be a wunderkind with a list of accomplishments longer than most MacArthur Fellows.

Yet, for 17/18-year-olds who happen to be mere mortals, the task of writing a resume might feel as absurdly impossible as being asked to perform an act of alchemy. Tasked with magically creating pure gold from a menacingly blank MS Word document, crazed thoughts begin to flood your mind: The only people agonizing over a resume should be middle-aged executives who were downsized after a hostile corporate takeover, whatever that is…I’m a senior in high school for crying out loud—I go to school and work the cash register at CVS in the summers. What more do you want from me!?

Try to take a deep breath as you emerge from your Mike-Judgean nightmare and back into reality. In the following article, we will explain everything you need to know about college application resumes, including:

• Which college accept resumes

Colleges that require resumes

Colleges that consider resumes.

• Resumes for scholarship consideration
• Honors College applications that require resumes
• Deciding whether or not to include a resume
• How to write a college resume

Let’s begin by looking at universities where admissions officers would rather poke their eyeballs out with a plastic spork than review an undergraduate applicant’s resume.

Colleges that do not accept resumes 

Some schools fully recognize that you are, in many cases, not even yet a legal adult, let alone one whose career accomplishments would necessitate a resume. The University of Virginia explicitly states: “We do not accept resumes, research abstracts, or writing portfolios.” In 2018, Duke University adopted a similar ban on resume submission for undergraduate hopefuls. Yale is a smidgen less concrete, warning that, “Generally speaking, applicants should not submit additional résumés, except in the case of professional employment experience in the performing arts.” The New Haven gatekeepers go on to elaborate that they have zero interest in hearing about more than your ten most recent/important activities already included elsewhere in the application. Tufts University is another elite institution that is a full-fledged member of Team No-Resume, stating that “we are not able to accept a supplemental resume of activities.” Before you submit a single resume with one of your applications, carefully read the admissions homepages of all of your prospective schools to make sure that they don’t have a comparably discouraging language.

On the other end of the spectrum, certain schools/programs such as Cornell University’s prestigious School of Hotel Administration require you to submit a resume with your application. The vaunted Eastman School of Music at the University of Rochester has an identical requirement. Resumes will also be necessary for all pursuits within the University of Michigan’s School of Music, Theater & Dance. The University of Wisconsin-Madison only demands a curriculum vitae from prospective undergraduate business students. While many universities used to require the submission of resume for all incoming students, regardless of major, it is rare to come across such a mandate in 2021. Florida State University is one of the more prominent schools that still falls into this category, although it has shifted to “strongly recommended” status in recent years.

Colleges that encourage resume submission

The College of New Jersey says that “applicants are encouraged to mail in an Activity Resume to detail involvement in clubs and organizations, employment, internships, volunteering, education, etc.” Business-oriented Bentley University applicants are instructed not to hesitate in sending a resume along with their application. Southern Methodist University strongly encourages homeschooled applicants to submit an activities resume, but does not place the same expectation on traditional applicants. Washington State University asks undergraduate applicants 25 years and older to strongly consider submitting a CV, but they do not have the same demand of the regular applicant pool.

MIT, which uses its own application, warns that applicants “are welcome to submit a supplemental resume, but submitting a resume instead of filling out our activity list can hurt you (so don’t).” Interestingly, MIT’s application only leaves space for you to list four activities, six fewer than the Common App allows. Columbia University will consider resumes as well but encourages applicants “to convey the breadth and depth of your extra-curricular pursuits within the Activities section of your admission application.” Only in extreme cases is it necessary to include a separate document. Similarly, Penn will accept resumes but makes clear that, “All of the information that we feel is crucial in making an admission decision is contained within our required documents.”

Scholarship applications may require a resume

Many private scholarship applications will request or require the inclusion of a resume, so if you plan on applying to one or more such 3rd party contests, it will be necessary to create a resume, even if your prospective colleges do not ever desire to see it. However, before you dedicate too much time to applying for private scholarships, revisit our article on How to Find College Scholarships for a breakdown of where most scholarship money actually comes from and how you can position yourself to receive the most aid possible.

Honors College applications sometimes require resumes

Florida International University’s Wilkes Honors College states that “To strengthen your Wilkes Honors College application, we encourage you to submit a resume and academic research paper.” The College of Charleston’s Honors College flat-out requires a resume. The Plan II Honors Program at the University of Texas at Austin goes even further, requiring an expanded resume and practically begs for detail warning applicants that, “This is NOT a place to be overly concise.” Clarkson University’s Honors Program also requires a CV but conversely limits the document to a one-page maximum. Visit our Top Honors Programs Dataverse page for more information.

Will a resume add anything to my application profile?

This is the essential question that applicants need to ask themselves when debating whether or not to submit this extra info to a “resume-optional” institution. There are, after all, plenty of admissions officers who get annoyed at the inclusion of extraneous submissions from an applicant. When you are responsible for sifting through the 108,837 applications at UCLA and a student has included a dozen writing samples and a seven-minute video about their passion for LARPing, annoyance may only be the tip of the emotional iceberg. To a (slightly) lesser extent, the inclusion of a student resume that restates everything verbatim already laid out in the activities section of the Common App will also cause consternation for super-busy admissions professionals.

A fair way to weigh whether an optional resume adds any value to your overall submission is to make a list of the impressive things about yourself not included anywhere else in your application. If that list ends up containing nothing of actual committee-swaying quality, consider shutting down the whole operation. If there are indeed brag-worthy achievements on your list that, for one reason or another, cannot be included in the regular application and are resume-appropriate, fire away.

How to write a resume for your college application

Okay, if you’ve made it to this point then you must be one of those uncommon applicants for whom a resume is either a) required/recommended; or b) will add something significant to your application. Here are some tips for writing a meaningful college applicant resume:

• Most basic resume formats include one’s Education, Experience, and Honors. These three headings will serve you well in this venture, and take note—they align pretty closely with the Common App format.
• Follow the same general advice that we provided in our piece on How to Complete the College Application Activities List . Pay attention to chronology, accuracy, clarity of descriptions, and remain dedicated to only including items that genuinely add something to your candidacy.
• The Common App activities and honors sections have notoriously strict character limits that can make some activities and distinctions frustratingly difficult to fully convey. If you have captured a number of impressive national, state, or local awards and were unable to fit them on your Common App honors section, then a resume presents a wonderful opportunity to tell the committee about these achievements in glorious detail.
• Also include your work experience in greater detail, particularly if it relates to your field of study or demonstrates leadership. Likewise with community service. While it’s better to assume progressively more responsibility in one or two volunteer organizations as you ascend through the grades, some students spread themselves around to a host of charitable causes, often through their place of worship. In this instance, a resume will actually be the best format in which to share your varied efforts with the committee.

Final thoughts on resumes and college admissions

If your prospective colleges give you a black-and-white answer to the question of resume submission, then simply follow their directives. If one or more of your potential schools does encourage enclosing a CV with your application, then go about creating one, remembering the tips outlined above. Chances are that a resume will come in handy at some point during the application process—whether one of the schools on your list requires/recommends/accepts them or if a scholarship or honors college opportunity is in the cards.

• Navigating the Admissions Process

Dave Bergman

Dave has over a decade of professional experience that includes work as a teacher, high school administrator, college professor, and independent educational consultant. He is a co-author of the books The Enlightened College Applicant (Rowman & Littlefield, 2016) and Colleges Worth Your Money (Rowman & Littlefield, 2020).

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By submitting my email address. i certify that i am 13 years of age or older, agree to recieve marketing email messages from the princeton review, and agree to terms of use., write a high school student resume for college applications.

Think resumes are only for job seekers? Think again. A high school student resume gives colleges a snapshot of your accomplishments, extracurriculars, hobbies, and work history. They can also be a useful tool for prepping for a college interview or to give to the teachers who are writing your letters of recommendation .

Not sure how to get started? Follow our tips for crafting a standout resume for college and scholarship applications.

What should go on a high school student resume for college admissions?

Any of the sections below could appear on your resume for college applications. Pick an assortment that works for you!

• Heading with your name, address, and e-mail
• High school information with your graduation date, GPA (weighted), class rank, and SAT/ACT scores
• Academic awards, publications, honors, and other achievements
• Coursework (summer programs, college courses, or other specialized workshops that do not appear on your high school transcript)
• Extracurricular activities
• Community service
• Work experience
• Special skills (e.g. foreign language fluency or HTML expertise)

When should you submit a resume to colleges?

Some colleges and scholarship committees request or recommend that you include a high school resume with your application materials. (But don’t submit a resume if they don’t ask for one—following instructions is a key application strategy.) Bring your resume to college interviews and give copies to your college counselor and teachers so that they can write you the strongest possible recommendation letter.

Tips for Composing Your College Admissions Resume

1. keep it concise..

Pare down the activities you showcase to the most brag-worthy and most representative of you as a candidate. Do colleges need to know that you were on the field hockey team for one semester in Grade 9? Probably not. The standard rule of thumb is to stick to one or two pages.

2. Focus on depth and length of commitment.

When deciding which activities and accomplishments make the cut, keep in mind that colleges would much rather see you excited about one or two key experiences than sporadic involvement in 20 clubs. If having an after-school job limited your ability to participate in clubs or sports, make sure your resume plays up your work responsibilities, training, and on-the-job skills.

Read More: Everything You Need to Know About Applying to College

3. Provide detail whenever possible.

The details are what set a resume apart from a list of extracurriculars on a standard college application. For example, when describing your involvement in the French Club make sure to include:

• school years/hours per week you participated
• specific contributions (e.g. "Organized a successful after-school film series to introduce our community to French cinema and culture" )
• leadership roles (e.g. "Treasurer, Grade 12" )
• unique details that will make you stand out

4. Highlight things you weren’t able to write about in your college essays or short answers.

Use your high school resume to show colleges something new. If your devotion to photography didn’t make it on the application but is a big part of who you are, then showcase your photography cred on your resume.

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5. Formatting is key.

Make your resume easy to scan. Divide information into sections with clear headings, bulleted lists, and a consistent font. Use a system of organization that works for you. (Chronological, by importance of activity, or by time commitment are a few options.) Don’t forget to proofread !

6. Be honest and accurate.

Colleges know how to spot inconsistencies in your high school student resume, and they won’t hesitate to call your counselor to verify information that doesn't seem right. So don't tell them that you have practice for the school play for 30 hours per week—unless drama club is somehow your full-time job!

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How to Write a Resume for College Admissions - the Ultimate Guide

Writing a resume for a college admissions package requires a different approach to writing a job application resume. Here are the five things you’ll need to consider with answers below.

• Do you need to write a resume for college?
• What’s the difference between a professional resume and a college application resume?
• How to show off your soft skills on a college resume?
• What you should put on your resume vs. your college essay vs. a letter of recommendation?
• Other frequently asked questions about college resumes

Don't like to read? Watch the video instead!

Introducing our expert

At Everydae we know a LOT about making studying fun so you can ace high school without the stress. But we also recognize that we’re not a specialist on everything (!)

That’s why, for many of our blog posts, we interview an expert. This is someone who has spent years in the field helping hundreds, if not thousands of high school students prepare for the next stage of their lives.

Today’s expert is Dr. Genevieve Morgan from Dr. Morgan College Counseling . Dr. Morgan helps families navigate the admissions and career planning process to find the right-fit college for them.

Before we begin...

What is a college resume for admission?

A college resume for admission is a 1-2 page document that describes a high school student’s notable accomplishments.

‍ It is different to a job resume in that it can also highlight key projects or experiences that demonstrate to an admissions officer why the student will be a good fit for their college. Calling out project-based achievements is especially important for students who don’t have an extensive job history or volunteer experiences.

Part 1: Do you need to write a resume for college?

That depends. Whether you submit a resume with your college application (or bring one to your college interviews) varies from institution to institution.

‍ Some colleges have banned students from submitting a resume, while some colleges require it.  Before you begin downloading a high school resume templates, make sure you have your shortlist of schools handy so you can establish:

• Which schools want you to submit a resume
• Any additional information the school provides on what they are looking for in the application

Part 2: What's unique about a high school resume compared to a professional resume?

The goal of a professional resume is to get you a job and the most important thing that employers are looking for is whether you have the skills they need to get the job done.

‍ In contrast, college resumes can focus less on hard skills. It should give a college admissions officer insight into why you would be a good addition to the student body and how you are different from other students.

As Dr. Morgan, a professional admissions consultant puts it:

“Something that the college resume should have, which you won't see on a regular job resume… is you need to communicate that you're curious, that you're passionate [and] that you're innovative. It’s a lot of the things that educators call soft skills.”

This other piece of advice is also useful to understand:

“I know from both a college and a high school admissions committee perspective that you're looking for the kind of kids who will be fun to teach, who will help sustain and create the fabric of an institution... And that will be kind, that will be good roommates, good classmates, people that other people want to collaborate with.”

Part 3: How do you show off your soft skills on a resume?

To show off your soft skills on a resume, you should highlight project-based accomplishments amongst any work history, grades and extracurriculars.

‍ This shows an admissions committee that you have more depth than an applicant who simply lists “babysitter” or “volunteer” or “tutor” on their resume.

What’s an example of a soft skill you can highlight on your CV?

An example of a soft skill on your resume is a project that you’ve done outside of school that demonstrates your creativity, ingenuity and drive. Dr. Morgan gives a great example of a soft skill that one of her students demonstrated:

Dr. Morgan: So I have a kid this year who went to go do some community service and he realized that one of the things that people are lacking is an ability to wash their clothes. Homeless people don't have access to washing machines so he designed a portable washer for clothes, it's like a salad spinner. Have you ever used a salad spinner?

Everydae: Yeah! I have one on top of my fridge, hasn't been used in a while but yes.

Dr Morgan : All right! So he took that design. And he made it bigger and then he used a 3-D printer… and he actually has a working model of this very cheap way to make a portable contraption that homeless people can use to wash the clothes. So, that's something that went on his resume. 

Part 4: What should you put on your resume vs. your college essay or letter of recommendation?

One of the big mistakes that students make is that they repeat themselves across all aspects of their application.

‍ A better approach is to use each part of your submission to show off a unique part of your personality and achievements. By highlighting different aspects of yourself in each area of the application, you’ll convey that you're a well-rounded person. Here’s how:

Teacher/counselor recommendations:

These will usually focus on what you have been doing in the classroom. As Dr. Morgan puts it:

[Teachers are] going to use anecdotes about a project in math or how you brought a group project together and steered everyone in the right direction. Or they're going to talk about a particular paper that you wrote about the Great Gatsby, etc.

As a result, letters of recommendation are a great way to show how academically accomplished you are and how you can effectively solve problems in a school setting.

The resume:

While your recommendations usually focus on events that take place within a school setting, your resume is the place where your projects and innovative accomplishments outside of school can shine. Here’s a trick from Dr. Morgan that you can use if you’re struggling to come up with ideas:

Talk to your mother, your father, your aunt and ask them about things that they remember about you. You will find stories there that as a student you may just not have thought about. 

Pro tip: While you think that the accomplishments your family mentions may not sound as exciting as inventing a washing machine for homeless people, there is always a story to tell. As Dr. Morgan went on to say:

I've never found a student who is not interesting. Even if they think that they're not interesting, they always have something cool about them. And then the other thing is that admissions counselors are looking for real people, they want authenticity. 

High school resumes provide a quick overview and insight into the breadth of your accomplishments as a student. Your essay will focus on a deeper exploration. It gives you the chance to share how you view yourself and the world in more detail. And it gives more clues to an admissions officer as to whether you’ll be a good fit for the school and its culture. 

The bottom line is, you should take every opportunity to tell the admissions committee something new about yourself that they don't know. 

Need college essay ideas? Use this ultimate hack.  

Part 5: Frequently asked questions

Q: How long should a college application resume be?

Your college application resume should be no longer than 2 pages. Many people also advise that one page is enough, but it completely depends on you and which aspects of your past you want to highlight in your application. Any longer than two pages and you’re in danger of the admissions committee not reading it.

Q: What information goes on a college application resume?

• Your Personal details:
• Your name, home address and your email. Note: if you don’t already have a professional email address, then now is a great time to create one
• School information:
• The name of your high school
• Graduation date
• Weighted GPA
• Class Rank (if applicable)
• SAT/ACT scores (if applicable)
• Awards and accomplishments
• Academic accomplishments
• Local news in which you’ve been featured
• Key personal projects you want to highlight
• Publications you have been featured in
• Key courses you have done well in (including APs)
• Summer programs or college courses you have taken
• Any specialized courses that are not on your transcript
• Extracurricular activities, hobbies and special skills
• Highlight what you achieved and why these are important to you
• Work experience
• Don’t just list your job title and dates, include some bullet points about what you learned/achieved

Who is Dr. Morgan College Counseling ?

When I first started helping kids, it was essays and supplements. Now I offer everything from list building to interview prep. One of the things I most enjoy is helping kids with scholarship applications. Often people think that if they apply to the public schools, they'll get the best deal but in reality a lot of the private schools offer more aid.  ‍ I also work with rising ninth and tenth graders to help them plan their high school career. People think that sometimes you have to be involved in 10 different extracurriculars, when in reality you should find what really makes your heart sing.  ‍ In short, I’m a full-service one-stop shop!

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Should I include my resume when it is optional in my college applications? Answered

3 schools I am applying to, Northeastern University, Northwestern University, and Cornell University, all give me the option through Common App to upload my resume. I have a resume I have been updating and improving for the past three years with the help of a family friend who works in HR and looks at a lot of resumes. Most things on my resume are covered in my activities section, however, I had to leave a lot of information out about my most important activities because of the 150 character limit. I also have my community service on my resume, which I touch on in the activities section but couldn't explain all of it. I've looked online for advice, and I have gotten contradicting answers. Should I upload it? Is there a chance it could hurt my application if it is deemed to be repetitive of my activities section?

Hello! I'm confused as to the content you are including in the resume. How are your formatting it? What categories are you including?

@RaTe It mainly includes information about my main two extracurricular activities, instrumental music and robotics. It also lists my skills and certifications, awards and honors, and my community service activities. It currently looks more like a resume for someone who is applying for a job, however without any job experience listed (as I haven't had one)

Earn karma by helping others:

I would submit the resume to all three schools but do some serious editing so what you write on the resume under each activity give more "color" and "dimension" to the activity without it being too long. If you have 10 activities on your resume and the first 2 sentences are exactly a re-hash of what you wrote on the common app then the application readers are going to be thinking " this is redundant so why did this person submit a rehash of the common app activities". Think of the resume in the context of the application reader as a 1 or 2 pages fact sheet they can refer to versus the 20 pages to 25 pages of common app material. It's like when you go to the car show, you can pick up a 1-page fact sheet of the car or a lengthy brochure. The Common App is the lengthy brochure so make the Fact Sheet pop out and bring attention to the most important things about you.

Hope that helps.

Good luck with your college application journey.

My resume only lists my main two extracurricular activities, instrumental music and robotics. There are about 7-10 bullet points under each, for robotics I say my job and leadership position on the robotics team, the community events I help run, and how I mentor younger teams. For instrumental music, I explain my position in my concert band, my leadership in my marching band, and other activities I've done related to band.

I also have my skills and certifications, my awards and honors (which are already mentioned on my common app so I probably could get rid of that), my community involvement, and then some info about my schooling (which would also be removed as the college would already know that information).

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Sat / act prep online guides and tips, the 7 things that really look good on a college application.

College Admissions , College Info

What looks good on a college application? It's the question nearly every high school student will ask at some point while applying to college. But is there a clear answer?

Fortunately, the answer is yes! Read on to learn what colleges look for in applicants, what looks really good on a college application, and what kinds of myths there are about good things to put on a college application.

What Are Colleges Looking for in Applicants?

Everyone applying to college has wondered, "What exactly are colleges looking for in applicants?" In other words, what looks good on a college application?

While all colleges are different, of course, with some valuing certain qualities or skills more or less than other schools, all colleges generally look for smart, studious, ambitious, and passionate students.

Therefore, your college application should emphasize your best, most impressive qualities. For example, if you play the violin and want to study music in college, you'll want to touch on this interest you have in different areas of your application.

A good college application will also showcase your sincere interest in the school. You wouldn't be applying to a college unless you had a reason to want to go there, right? Make sure to explain (especially if you need to write a "Why This College" essay ) exactly how you became interested in the school and why you think it's a good fit for you and your goals.

You don't need to be the next Marie Curie or Stephen Hawking, but you should be open to new opportunities and willing to challenge yourself.

Overall, the basic point of a college application is to make you stand out from other applicants in a positive, memorable, and unique way.

This fact is especially important in light of how many first-year applications colleges receive each year. According to the 2019 report by the National Association for College Admission Counseling (NACAC) , the number of first-year applications received by US colleges increased by 6% from fall 2017 to fall 2018.

The report found that "the average number of applications for each admission office staff member (excluding administrative staff) for the Fall 2017 admission cycle was 1,035 for public institutions and 461 for private institutions."

These trends indicate that your application will definitely need to leave a lasting impression on the admissions committee if you hope to get into that school.

The degree by which you must stand out from other applicants will depend on how selective a particular school is. In general, the more selective a college is, the more impressive and unique your application will have to be.

Finally, what looks good on an application will vary depending on the college and what the college values. For instance, at colleges that don't place a big emphasis on standardized tests, a high SAT score likely won't be much of a factor in admissions.

This is just a general overview of what colleges look for in applicants. So what looks really good on a college application? Up next, we look at the specific qualities you should strive to include on your application so you can raise your chances of getting accepted.

What Looks Good on a College Application? 7 Key Elements

In addition to key personality traits, such as ambition, passion, genuine interest, and academic curiosity, what looks really good on a college application?

In general, a great application will have most or all of the following elements:

• A high GPA (relative to what admitted students have) and a rigorous curriculum
• Strong test scores (relative to what admitted students have)
• A specific, honest, and well-written personal statement and/or essays
• A unique extracurricular interest or passion (a "spike," as we like to call it)
• Volunteering experience with measurable impact
• Compelling letters of recommendation written on your behalf
• Work experience, particularly jobs related to your academic or professional interests

It's OK if you don't have every single quality listed above, but if you do, your chances of getting accepted to the college of your dreams will go way up!

Now then, let's take a look at each of these qualities in more detail.

#1: Excellent Grades in Challenging Courses

The first important part of the college application is the transcript, which consists of your GPA and the names and types of classes you've taken in high school.

Most people believe a high GPA (the definition of which can vary at different colleges) will make an application stronger. And this is true!

According to NACAC, 75% of colleges ranked grades in high school classes considerably important. In fact, this factor was ranked the most important of any in the report.

What's truly important, though, isn't that you simply have a high GPA overall but rather that you have a GPA that's higher than the average GPA of admitted students at the college you're applying to.

To find a college's average GPA, search "[School Name] PrepScholar admission requirements" on Google and then click our database link to that school. This page will show you what the school's average GPA is, in addition to other admission requirements.

For example, if you want to apply to Notre Dame, you would search for "Notre Dame PrepScholar admission requirements" and click the link to our Notre Dame admission reqs page , which looks like this:

As you can see, Notre Dame's average (weighted) GPA for admitted applicants is 4.06. As a result, if you're applying here, you'll want to have a GPA of at least 4.06, preferably higher so you will be an above-average applicant.

It's not just about getting a high GPA, though; you must also take a range of challenging courses throughout high school if you really wish to impress an admissions committee. According to the NACAC report, 73 percent of colleges rated grades in college prep courses as considerably important. This means you'll want to take not just basic-level classes but also some AP, honors, and/or IB courses, particularly in subjects you are good at and might want to continue to study in college or major in.

The 2019 NACAC report found that a whopping 84% of colleges ranked an applicant's rigor of curriculum moderately or considerably important.

Think about it: though a perfect 4.0 might look great at an initial glance, if you got this high GPA by only taking the easiest classes available and didn't challenge yourself with higher-level coursework, your transcripts aren't likely to impress college admissions officers that much.

Even if you started high school with lower grades, an upward grade trend is a great point to emphasize on your application. This suggests that you're capable of bouncing back from any difficulties you might face and are willing to put in the work necessary for excelling in college.

#2: High Test Scores

Test scores, mainly SAT/ACT scores, are another key part of college applications (unless, of course, you're applying to colleges that don't require test scores ).

On the NACAC report, 83% of colleges believe admission test scores are at least moderately important. This is why it's vital that you try to get as high an SAT/ACT score as you can, ideally one in at least the 75th percentile for your colleges.

The 75th percentile means that 75% of admitted students at a particular school achieved this score or lower. Reaching (or surpassing) this threshold means that you're scoring higher than most other admitted applicants are—and well above that college's average score.

To find the middle 50% (that is, the 25th and 75th percentile SAT/ACT scores) for a school, search on Google for "[School Name] PrepScholar admission requirements." Click the link to our page for the school to see its requirements, including its average SAT/ACT scores.

For example, say you're planning to apply to NYU. Here's what the SAT scores section on NYU's PrepScholar admission reqs page looks like:

Here, we can see the average SAT score for NYU is 1440—that's pretty high, in the 95th percentile nationally !

To really stand out as an applicant, though, you'll want to aim for at least the 75th percentile. For NYU, that's 1510, which corresponds to the 98th percentile, or the top 1% of test takers.

Since you're likely applying to more than just one school, you'll need to set an SAT / ACT goal score , that is, a score high enough to get you into all the colleges you're applying to.

To set a goal score, start by making a chart of all the schools you're applying to. You can make your own chart or download a blank template .

Below is a sample SAT goal score chart:

Next, look up the 25th and 75th percentile SAT scores for each of the schools you're applying to using our PrepScholar admission requirements pages. (Follow the steps above for NYU to learn how to do this.)

Once you've got these scores, write them in your chart as so:

Now, look at all the 75th percentile scores in your chart. The highest score will be your goal score, as this is the one most likely to get you into all the schools you're applying to.

With our example chart, the highest score is 1480, or the 75th percentile score for the University of Illinois and UW Wisconsin. By getting a 1480 or higher, you'll be getting an impressive score not just for these two schools, school but also for Marquette and MSU, thereby raising your chances of getting into all colleges you're applying to.

#3: Sincere, Specific, and Well-Written Essays

The personal statement is an important part of your college application as it's one of the only areas where you can really showcase your personality.

According to the 2019 NACAC survey, 56% of schools consider application essays moderately or considerably important. While some colleges don't require essays , those that do usually place at least moderate importance on them.

So how can you ensure your essay will impress the admissions committee? Generally, colleges are looking for three main qualities in a personal essay:

• Honesty: What you write about should have actually happened to you and should be how you actually feel. Exaggerating details and outright lying are big no-nos here!
• Specificity: Using concrete details to effectively convey your thoughts, views, and experiences will make your essay a lot more memorable, personable, and—most importantly—unique.
• Eloquence: Don't expect to get accepted anywhere if your essay is poorly written and full of grammar and spelling errors. A great personal statement has a sensible organization, tells a compelling story, and is completely free of technical errors.

Below are some steps you can take to guarantee that your essay will have all three qualities.

Step 1: Brainstorm Significant Moments From Your Life

What you write about for your college essay will vary depending on the prompt(s) you're given from your school or the prompt you choose (for example, the Common App and Coalition App allow you to choose from among several prompts for your essay).

In general, you'll want to pick a topic that meets the following criteria:

• It really happened and was significant to you: If you're writing about a specific incident, it should be something that actually happened and that had a large impact on how you define yourself, your goals, and/or your interests.
• It's specific and interesting: Don't write about a broad, universal topic that can apply to tons of other applicants as well. Instead, focus on an event, issue, person, or struggle that's unique to you and your life.
• It reveals something important about you: The essay is meant to highlight something you think the admissions committee should know about you, such as a personality trait you have, how you overcame some sort of challenge, or how you became interested in a field of study.
• It has a positive lean: While you don't need to pick a topic that's overly light or cheery, it should still have an ultimately positive lean that reveals something good about you rather than something bad, controversial, or immoral.

Step 2: Write Your Essay

The next step is to actually begin writing your essay. Don't worry too much about grammar and flow at this point; just get down your ideas and start deciding which details and examples might work well in your essay.

As you write, remember to channel your inner voice. This essay should sound like the real you, not an imitation of what you think colleges want to hear. So if you're the sarcastic type, you might want to include a joke or two, for instance. Don't forget that the essay is a way for the admissions committee to learn more about you, so don't shy away from your true self!

On that same note, it's OK to get creative here. The essay isn't an academic essay you'd write for English class—it's a story. Feel free to inject your writing with various literary techniques , such as a non-chronological organization, realistic dialogue, and memorable imagery.

Lastly, make sure you're sufficiently answering the prompt and are abiding by all technical requirements (such as length). You can check a college's essay requirements by referring to its application requirements page or by reading the instructions on the Common App, Coalition App, or Universal College App websites (if submitting your application through one of these platforms).

An essay that's too long might get cut off when you submit it electronically, so be sure it adheres to all the requirements.

Step 3: Edit and Proofread Several Times

Once you have a rough draft of your college essay, it's time to polish it up for submission.

The best way to edit is to put your essay away for a few days. This will give you some distance away from your writing, allowing you to look back at your essay later with a fresher perspective.

As you reread your essay, mark any areas in it that are unclear, awkward, or irrelevant to the main point you're trying to make with it. You should also correct any obvious typos or errors, such as mistakes in grammar, spelling, or punctuation.

Once you've done this process a few times, give your essay to someone to read. Ideally, this will be a person you trust, such as a parent, teacher, counselor, or tutor. Have the person you choose offer clear feedback on your essay and check that you've met all requirements. Edit your essay as needed in accordance with the comments you get.

After you've finished all of this, you should now have a perfect college essay to submit with your application!

#4: A Spike in Your Extracurriculars

Almost every college will want to know what kinds of extracurricular activities you do or have done in your spare time.

Indeed, 49% of colleges surveyed regard students' extracurricular activities moderately or considerably important. Ask yourself: what are your interests outside of school and how do you engage in them?

The trick here is to provide not a list of all the random activities you've done but rather a detailed overview of one to two of your most passionate interests and any big achievements you've made in them.

In other words, you need to figure out what your "spike" is, a concept which PrepScholar co-founder and Harvard alum Allen Cheng describes in his expert guide on how to get into the Ivy League .

To put it simply, a spike is deep accomplishment in and knowledge of a particular field.

As an example, say you plan to major in biology. You'll stand out as an applicant if you have tons of biology- or science-related experiences under your belt. Maybe you're part of your school's biology club, or maybe you volunteered at a local research lab, which taught you the basics of handling lab equipment.

In addition to having a variety of experiences and sufficient background knowledge in the field, you want to highlight any relevant major accomplishments you have. For instance, maybe you won a science fair your sophomore year of high school; most recently, you submitted an award-winning invention idea to a national science contest. All of these accomplishments illustrate your deep accomplishment and knowledge in the field of science!

As you can see, this concept of the spike is the opposite of being well rounded, which most students assume they need to be (read the next section to learn more about this myth).

If you're not sure what your spike is just yet, take some time to try out new activities and explore any interests you have, both in and outside of school. Over time you should start to get a feel for what you're passionate about and what you can see yourself committing to in the future.

#5: Compelling Letters of Recommendation

Most colleges require at least one letter of recommendation from either your high school counselor or a high school teacher (or both).

The 2019 NACAC survey indicates that 54% of colleges consider teacher recommendations at least moderately important, while a higher 55% consider counselor recommendations the same. Therefore, we can say it's pretty important to secure great recommendation letters for your application.

If you're asking for a letter from a teacher , make sure to choose someone whose class you got a high grade in (ideally an A) and who is familiar with your abilities, ambitions, and interests. Typically, you'll need to submit at least one letter from a teacher who taught a core class (so math, English, science, or social studies/history).

It's a good idea to also get a letter from a teacher who works in the field you plan to major in. So if you got an A in AP English and plan to major in English, asking that teacher for a recommendation letter would give a great boost to your application.

While you don't have to be best buddies with the teacher you ask, they should definitely know you well , beyond the classroom, so they can effectively explain to admissions committees what makes you special, that is, what makes you worth admitting.

For example, if you did research with a particular teacher, are part of a club this teacher coaches or leads, or helped out this teacher with a project, this would be a good person to ask to write a letter for you.

Once you've secured a recommendation letter writer, be sure to provide them with any materials or information they might need to help them craft a compelling letter .

#6: Volunteering Experience With Measurable Impact

Colleges love it when an applicant has not simply volunteered but has also made a measurable impact with their volunteering efforts. What does this mean exactly? If you have volunteered somewhere or for an organization, your assistance should have resulted in a noticeable, positive change to the group, community, or area you were aiming to help.

For instance, say you volunteered at a local library. Maybe the library was struggling to get funds to continue operating, and you came up with the idea to hold a 24-hour reading marathon in order to raise money. The fundraiser ended up making more than $5,000, a figure that would be a concrete indicator of the positive impact your service had on the library. With your college application, then, you could specifically mention how your initiative allowed the library to remain open.

Note that you don't need to have assumed a leadership role in order to have made a positive impact through your service. That said, college admissions committees are often very big fans of students who show evidence of their budding leadership skills.

#7: (Relevant) Work Experience

Although you're certainly not required to work a part-time job in high school, having some work experience on your college applications, especially any jobs that are related to what you want to study or do professionally, will help you stand out in a positive way.

Even if your job isn't connected to a long-term academic or career goal you have, any (part-time) work experience you have will be great to put down on your application because it emphasizes your sense of responsibility, maturity, and willingness to work for your goals, key qualities that are usually considered important for success in college.

Also, if you have any room on the application to elaborate on your job, I suggest explaining why you initially took the job and what values or skills it's taught you, such as the importance of responsibility or how to work with certain equipment that you'll likely use again in the future.

4 Myths About What Looks Good on a College Application

What looks really good on a college application? Many students think they know, but the truth is that there are a lot of myths out there about what you should include on your application.

Below, we introduce to you the top four myths about what looks good on college applications.

Myth 1: Being Well Rounded Is Critical for Success

One of the most pervasive myths out there about what looks good on a college application is the idea of being well rounded.

Many students assume they'll need to have tons of extracurricular activities on their applications; this, they believe, will emphasize their array of interests as well as their knowledge of a variety of fields. But all this really tells admissions committees is that you're stretching yourself too thin and (most likely) lack focus on a specific endeavor in your life.

What colleges actually want to see is a spike, that is, a single passion. This allows colleges to get a clearer feel for who you are, what you're interested in, and what your goals are. Having a spike lets you stand out in a truly meaningful way, whereas being well rounded will make you forgettable and seem too similar to other applicants.

Spikes are especially important at highly selective colleges and universities , such as Harvard, Yale, and other Ivy League-level schools . You can read more about how to develop a spike in our guide to getting into the Ivy League . Alternatively, if you're interested in pursuing education at a liberal arts school , check out our article on how to figure out what to go to college for .

Myth 2: Essays Aren't That Important

After Time published a 2014 article on why college application essays don't actually matter all that much , students began to fear that all their hard work on their statements wouldn't mean much in the end, if at all.

But while some colleges don't require personal essays , most colleges do require at least one or two essays—and will place a decent amount of emphasis on it, especially if it is being used as a deciding factor between two otherwise equally qualified applicants.

Even though you should approach the essay seriously, it's still generally rare for an exceptionally well-written essay to make up for tons of low grades and poor test scores. On the flip side, if you have a great application but a badly written essay, that essay alone could get you rejected!

Therefore, make sure that you are following all the steps listed above so you can craft the perfect statement for your application.

Myth 3: An A in an Easy Class Is Better Than a B in a Hard Class

Many students believe it's better to stick to the classes you know you'll get As in, but this piece of advice is misguided when it comes to college applications.

In general, colleges prefer students who challenge themselves by taking an array of difficult classes, such as AP and honors classes. And you don't have to get perfect grades in them. If you get a B in a tough AP class, for example, this will emphasize to the admissions committee that you are willing to take on new challenges and test your limits, traits that are necessary for succeeding in and after college.

On the other hand, getting As in all easy classes, though not totally unimpressive, is not nearly as interesting to colleges, as it suggests you're unwilling to push yourself and further hone your higher-level critical thinking skills.

All of this being said, try to avoid getting very low grades in any classes you take (regular or honors/AP). C and D grades obviously won't look great to an admissions committee, even if you got these grades while challenging yourself in AP classes.

If you can't get at least a B or B+ in a difficult class, it'll probably be better for you to drop it and switch to either the regular version of that class or an entirely different class altogether.

Myth 4: Only Perfect Applicants Get Admitted

Many students assume that if they have one little flaw in their application, such as a below-average test score or slightly low grade in a class, their chances of getting admitted to college will be slim to none.

This just isn't true.

Yes, a very low test score or a very poor transcript may cause you to get rejected from a college, but many colleges use a holistic admission process, meaning they look at and consider each individual applicant as a whole. So even if your application has a not-so-stellar component on it, this doesn't necessarily mean you'll be a reject.

In fact, at particularly selective colleges, such as the Ivy League , you'll often hear of cases in which ostensibly "perfect" applicants got rejected. This is most likely because they didn't have a spike in their applications (i.e., something that made them stand out).

Overall, just try your best to produce the best application you can, and then hope for a good result!

Takeaways: What Looks Good on a College Application

Applying to college is tough, and knowing what to put on your applications to make yourself stand out is even tougher. What looks really good on a college application?

Generally speaking, colleges want to see your passion, intellectual curiosity, willingness to challenge yourself, and academic accomplishments.

More specifically, though, colleges typically prefer applicants who have most or all of the following characteristics:

• Good grades and a challenging course load
• Strong test scores
• Honest, specific, and eloquent essays
• A spike in your extracurricular activities
• Compelling letters of recommendation
• Volunteer experience with clear impact on the groups or places you've helped
• Any relevant or impactful work experience

Finally, as you apply to college and try to think of good things to put on a college application, make sure you're aware of the following truths about the application process:

• It's better to have a spike than to be well rounded
• Essays are important!
• A B in a hard course is more impressive than an A in an easy course
• You can still get into your dream school even if your application isn't perfect

What's Next?

A great college application will get you admitted. Use our college acceptance calculator to get an estimated percentage of your chance of getting into your dream school, based on your SAT or ACT score and GPA.

One thing a great college application can have is a high SAT or ACT score. Get expert tips in our guides on how to get a perfect 36 on the ACT and how to get a perfect 1600 on the SAT .

Need help figuring out which colleges to apply to? Our guide teaches you how to narrow down your college choices so that you're applying to the best schools for you.

Hannah received her MA in Japanese Studies from the University of Michigan and holds a bachelor's degree from the University of Southern California. From 2013 to 2015, she taught English in Japan via the JET Program. She is passionate about education, writing, and travel.

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