Resumes

Resumes are commonly requested for scholarship applications as opposed to college applications. Even as a high school student, building a resume is a really smart idea. 

• Getting a Job: This is the most common reason! If you want a part-time job, summer job, or even just volunteer work, almost every employer will ask for a resume. It shows them quickly what you've done and if you're a good fit.

• College Applications: While your grades and essays are super important, some colleges (and definitely scholarship committees) want to see a resume. It's a quick way for them to get an overview of all your activities and accomplishments beyond just your academic transcript. Resumes allow you to elaborate on some of the criteria you were not able to share in the application. Just make sure that you do not simply repeat the information found in your application.

• Scholarship Applications: Many scholarships ask for a resume to see your extracurriculars, volunteer hours, awards, and work experience. This helps them decide if you deserve their money.

• Keeping Track of Your Achievements: High school goes by fast! A resume helps you remember all the cool things you've done – clubs, sports, awards, volunteer hours, projects, leadership roles. It's easy to forget these things if you don't write them down.

• Practicing for the Future: Learning to create a resume now is a valuable skill you'll use for the rest of your life when applying for jobs, internships, or even graduate school.

• Self-Discovery and Confidence: Putting everything down on paper can be a great way to see how much you've accomplished. It can boost your confidence and help you figure out what you're passionate about and what you want to do next.

In short, a resume is your personal highlight reel. It quickly tells people who you are, what you've done, and what you're capable of!

There are many fantastic free websites and tools that can help you create a professional-looking resume. Here are some of the best options:

What it is: TexQuest is an online program provided by the State of Texas (specifically the Texas State Library and Archives Commission). Think of it as a huge, free online library available to every K-12 student and teacher in Texas. It gives you access to reliable and safe educational resources, like articles, journals, and learning tools, that you usually have to pay for.

Why it's good for resumes: TexQuest is particularly good for resumes because it includes access to EBSCO LearningExpress Library. This part of TexQuest has a fantastic step-by-step resume builder.

• Guided Creation: It walks you through each section of a resume (contact info, education, work, activities, skills), so you don't have to guess what to put where.

• Examples & Tips: It often provides examples of how to word your experiences and accomplishments, even if they're from school projects, volunteer work, or clubs instead of traditional jobs.

• Professional Look: It helps you create a clean, organized, and professional-looking resume without needing any design skills.

• Cover Letter Help: Sometimes it also includes tools to build a matching cover letter, which is often needed when applying for jobs.

Free aspects: Completely Free for RISD students through Classlink. It has resources, including the resume builder in LearningExpress Library, and is100% free for all K-12 students and educators in Texas. Your school pays for the access, so you don't have to.

• No Hidden Fees: Unlike some other online resume builders, you won't be asked to pay to download or print your resume once you've built it using this resource.

Considerations:

• School Access Needed: You'll need to log in via Classlink. You can't just access it from anywhere without using that school-provided single sign-in platform.

• Focus on Content & Structure: While it helps you create a professional format, its main strength is guiding you through the content and structure of a resume. If you're looking for highly creative, graphic-heavy resume designs (like those you might find on Canva), this tool will be more about clear, traditional professionalism.

• Reliability: Because it's part of an official educational resource, the advice and tools within LearningExpress Library are generally very reliable and up-to-date with standard resume practices.

• What it is: Canva is a very popular graphic design platform that's known for its user-friendly interface and vast library of templates.

• Why it's good for resumes: They have tons of visually appealing resume templates, including many designed for students, that you can easily customize with your own information. You can change colors, fonts, and layouts with a simple drag-and-drop system. You can download your finished resume as a PDF.

• Free aspects: Canva has a robust free plan that includes access to many resume templates and design elements. While they have a "Pro" version with more features, the free version is more than enough for most high school students.

• Consideration: Some highly graphical templates might not be ideal for Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) that many large companies use to scan resumes. For most high school jobs or college applications, this isn't a huge concern, but if you're applying to a very large company, a simpler template might be better.

• What it is: Google Docs is a free online word processor that's part of Google's suite of tools.

• Why it's good for resumes: Google Docs has built-in resume templates that are simple, clean, and professional. It's easy to use, you can access your resume from anywhere with an internet connection (it auto-saves to Google Drive), and you can easily share or download it as a PDF.

• Free aspects: Completely free with a Google account.

• Consideration: The templates are more basic compared to Canva, but they are very ATS-friendly (meaning they are easy for resume scanning software to read).

• What they are: These are dedicated online resume builders. Many of them offer "free" versions or free trials.

• Why they're good for resumes: They often have step-by-step guidance, pre-written content suggestions (which can be super helpful when you're not sure what to write for your experiences), and a variety of professional templates designed to be ATS-friendly.

• Free aspects: Be careful with these. Many advertise as "free" but then require a payment to download your resume or access premium features. However, some do offer genuinely free basic downloads (often as a TXT file or sometimes PDF) or allow you to build and preview without payment. Always check their pricing structure carefully.

Recommendation: While they can be very helpful for structure and content ideas, make sure you understand if you'll actually be able to download a usable file for free before investing a lot of time.

• Start with a template: Don't stare at a blank page. Choose a template you like and fill in your information.

• Keep it to one page: For high school students, a one-page resume is almost always sufficient.

• Focus on achievements, not just duties: Instead of "Worked at the library," try "Organized over 200 books weekly, improving library efficiency."

• Include relevant sections: Education, work experience (even if it's babysitting or yard work), volunteer experience, extracurricular activities, clubs, sports, awards, and skills (like computer skills, leadership, teamwork, communication).

• Proofread! Always check for typos and grammatical errors. Ask a parent, teacher, or friend to review it.

• Save as a PDF: This ensures your resume looks the same on any computer and is generally the preferred format for applications.