Call it a CV, a resume, or Bob - it’s not easy to write one of those things. There’s the “goal” element, which is tricky. Honestly, I don’t care about how enlightening it will be to work at Taco Bell. I just want something to do Friday afternoons and I want some cash. Job experience? I’m a 14 year old high school student, what makes you think I have any experience in flipping burgers? I haven’t had an opportunity to gain any! Skills… uh, well, I can play a mean scale on the guitar, but that’s not going to help me ring up paper towels at Wal-Mart, will it? What kind of skills do you need at Wal-Mart anyway?

Rant aside, writing a resume is hard. I had to write one to secure my job at an elementary school, and now I have to write another one as part of a class assignment. We got a handout for this assignment, including a sample resume. I think I can safely say it was terrible. In the resume I wrote up, I listed honors I had received, along with a couple of sentences about each honor (like, “January, 2007 - Mock Trial Program - Received Judge’s Accolades for Best Witness in Round 1″ and then I wrote the role I played and stuff like that). In the sample resume, it said something like “2006 - Valedictorian” and then a bunch of random numbers. The only thing I could think was “What… the… fuck.” What are the numbers, which school named you valedictorian, what is the point of putting that down if you’re not going to explain it?

Really, now, is this what we’re being taught? How to write shoddy resumes that will ensure nothing but unemployment? It’s freaking “How Not To Write A Resume 101″! I’ll make a great teacher. I’m so innovative. I challenge the material. I’m not always right, but in this case I think I am. I am righteous!

So, to spoof the popular joke “How to make a website” articles (you know, “have big glitter fonts, embed music, etc.”), I have written an article as well, aptly titled “How to write a resume”. Examples taken right from my assignment handout.

1. Have a big fat list of accomplishments - and nothing else. Quantity over quality! No employer wants to know which school put you in AP Chemistry. All they care about is you looking impressive, dash the details.
2. You’ve got your list - now scatter its contents! No organization. Surprise is key. March 2007 - assembly presenter. Then right after that, August 2005 - Valedictorian! And of course, top it off with October 1997 - Graduated elementary school. Chronologi- blah blah blah. Who cares about order?
3. Misspell your own name - 7 times. Type it once, and copy-paste it for efficiency. Amelia should be Amnellia. Spell checking is so 2005.
4. Express yourself. Professional what? 5 exclamation points after your name is cute, damn it! Let’s not forget SMILEY FACES~!!!!!
5. Include an entire bit about crayons. “The Crayola factory manufactures approximately 70000 crayons a day, and the crayons come in over 200 colors. Crayola currently employs 20000 factory workers to make the crayon quota…” No need to restrain yourself. Crayons are good, which brings me to…
6. Leave marks all over your resume which look like they might be crayon doodles. Remember kindergarten and My Little Pony coloring books? Reminisce, for job applying is the perfect occasion.

Now that I think about it, I might have left the crayon marks, but the rest was already on that handout. I propose more funding for educational materials - namely proper handouts that aren’t littered with errors. If this continues, high school dropouts may get better jobs than those who graduate and learn this crap.

This entry was posted on Friday, August 24th, 2007 at 10:36 pm and is filed under School, Rantings. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Comments are closed. Deal with it.