Student CV Examples

Strong student CV examples demonstrate the skills you've acquired through your education and any academic, personal, or professional experience relevant to the target job.

The difference between student CVs and other professional CVs is their structure. While experienced professionals should rely on their hands-on experience described through past work, students in their CVs focus on their competencies and academic background.

Students often have experience with part-time jobs, extracurricular activities, and personal or community initiatives. All of that is valuable to represent in a strong student CV. Even without having worked full-time at a company, recruiters and hiring managers want to see what you bring to the table.

Be concise, efficient, effective, and use the limited space wisely. Don't elaborate on details that don't add value to your application. In the following chapters of this guide, we'll explain each aspect of a well-written student CV example.

Writing a professional summary for a student's CV is allowed, but it's almost standard to omit it unless there's a good reason to have one. Of course, if you have impressive professional achievements and unique skills, you can outline them in a short introductory section.

Otherwise, don't force it into your CV, as recruiters don't expect you to have a personal brand and professional identity that needs to be summarised at the top of the document. Also, student CVs are typically one page long, and all your competencies and experience are immediately apparent.

Skills can vary depending on the specific student's CV example. If you're targeting an entry-level job in the design field, you should list your creative and technical skills. On the other hand, if you're applying for a customer service job, focus on your interpersonal skills, such as conflict resolution or active listening. Always study the job requirements well and include as many as possible in your student CV.

Below are some examples of skills that work across many application scenarios for students.

Many companies use applicant tracking systems (ATS) in their hiring processes, and student CVs will be scanned by them as well. The ATS platforms are used to detect the candidates that are most fit for the job, and keywords are one of the aspects of your CV that will determine whether your student CV even reaches a human reader.

Keywords are often the skills needed for the job, so make sure to check as many boxes as possible when it comes to job requirements. They also vary by position, but below are some that are widely applicable.

As we mentioned above, it's important to think about ATS when creating your student CV. Besides the use of keywords described in the previous chapter of this guide, you should think about the overall layout and structure of your CV.

To keep it readable for ATS, don't use overly complex layouts and graphic elements that can sometimes cause problems. To avoid errors with sorting the information from your student CV, you should use standard section headings (Education, Skills, Work Experience, Volunteering, Projects, and so on). Also, stick with standard fonts, such as Arial, Calibri, or Helvetica.

As a young person entering the job market, you can feel the urge to express your creativity and show everything you've got. That is totally understandable, but you should be careful not to distract the reader and make them focus more on your design choices than on your capabilities and experience.

Adding some accent colour is completely fine, but keep in mind that your student CV is a professional document. Any visual and design elements should be used sparingly, and the focus should stay on the content.