What to Include or Omit from Your Resume

Your resume is a prospective school’s first impression of you. It represents your character, your skill sets, your accomplishments, and your qualifications. However, job seekers often tend to make the mistake of rushing their resume and end up making fatal errors. They end up putting in information that should be left out.

Here are some important Hints about what you should or should not include in your teacher resume:

1.) Achievements:  Of course you have to state your job functions, but also state the things you accomplished while performing your duties. You need to include everything that gives you an edge over other teachers. You will want to include items like the following list, but leave your personal and private accomplishments out.
a. What sets you apart from everyone else?
b. How were you an effective teacher in previous jobs?
c. How did you raise achievement rates of students?
d. How did your students benefit from your teaching strategies?
e. How did you contribute to the school community?
f. What kind of relationship did you have with your students’ parents, students, faculty, etc.?

2.) No life stories, please:  Only provide information to the potential principal that is relevant.  You should not include information like your age, weight, date of birth, color, race, or gender.  None of these things should affect the way an employer makes a decision in the first place.  Hobbies should not be included unless they are interrelated with your teaching or specifically asked for.

3.) Leave references off the resume:  You should never include the names or contact information for any references you may have.  You can supply them on a different sheet of paper and submit them when the school asks for them.

4.) Presentation is everything:  Make your resume as user friendly as possible.  Your personal characteristics should be reflected on your resume. It should be well written and organized.  Usually, a principal will spend no more than 20-30 seconds on an initial review of a resume. Only include the facts that are essential for the school to know.  Make your achievements stand out by putting them in bullet points while displaying your work information in a paragraph.

5.) Proper grammar is important:  This will leave an immediate bad impression on your prospective principal.  Make sure you edit and proofread your resume at least 3 times and have someone else proofread it too. Write short, descriptive sentences about your qualities and what you have achieved.  A resume is a professional document, so no personal nouns or pronouns ought to be used. Use a standard font and format, don’t get fancy. Always use professional, good quality paper for printing your resume.

6.) You’ve got mail: When a resume is sent via email, it will not be the same quality.  A resume can become distorted when sent as an email attachment.  There is a good chance it will not open in the same format on someone else’s computer.  The alignment or font may change.  In order to avoid this mess, make sure you check it with a friend and see if it opens in the same format. Saving your document in Rich Text format can make it easier to open with just about any program.

All of the hard work that you put into your resume will be rewarded with several job interviews.  This list should help you decide what should be included and what should be omitted from your resume.