There is no shortage of advice about resumes. Search online, and you’ll find countless templates, examples, and conflicting opinions about what makes a resume good. Ask ten recruiters what they look for, and you may get ten different answers.

For educators, that can make teaching resume writing surprisingly difficult. What advice should we give students? Which template should they use? And how do we help a high school student create a resume appropriate for someone with little or no traditional work experience?

Then there is the student who looks at the blank page and says, “I don’t have anything to put on a resume.”

Both challenges point to the same opportunity: students need more than a resume template. They need to understand what a resume is meant to convey and how to identify the experiences and skills they already have that are worth communicating.

A high school resume isn’t supposed to make a student look like they have years of professional experience. It should help an employer quickly understand what the student has done, what they can do, and what they have learned along the way. That requires more than filling in a template.

The Template Challenge

Online resume builders and EDP platforms such as Xello and Naviance can be valuable tools for introducing students to resume writing. They provide structure, help students organize information, and give them an accessible starting point.

The problem is that students mistake the generated document for the finished product.

Software can organize information, but it can’t determine which experiences matter most, how a student should describe them, or what will catch an employer’s attention. The result can be a resume that technically includes all the right sections but still feels flat.

A student might describe their experiences in lengthy paragraphs or might include bullet points such as “helped customers” or “worked on a team.” These statements aren’t inaccurate, but they don’t give an employer much insight into what the student actually learned or contributed.

This is where educators have an important opportunity. Instead of simply teaching students how to fill in a resume template, we can teach them how to edit and improve the results it produces.

The most valuable part of resume writing isn’t learning how to add sections. It is learning how to communicate experiences in a way that makes a student’s skills visible.

What are Employers Actually Looking for?

A high school resume isn’t expected to look like that of someone with 10 years of professional experience. Employers understand that students are early in their careers. They aren’t necessarily looking for an extensive work history; they’re looking for evidence of what a student can contribute. That might include communication, teamwork, problem-solving, responsibility, technical skills, or the ability to learn and apply new skills.

Students don’t necessarily need more experiences. They need to get better at recognizing the value of their existing experiences.

Consider a student who works at a local restaurant. “Responsible for taking orders and cleaning” describes the job but doesn’t convey much about the student’s abilities. What if the student had to manage multiple customer requests during a busy shift, communicate with coworkers, resolve a customer concern, or train a new employee? Those experiences give an employer evidence of communication, problem-solving, teamwork, and responsibility.

The same principle applies to a student who has never held a traditional job.

A student who organizes a school fundraiser has practice planning and communication. A student who participates in a team has experience collaborating toward a shared goal. A student who completes a research project has practice gathering information, analyzing evidence, and communicating findings.

The resume becomes stronger when students shift from “what was I responsible for?” to “what did I actually do, and what does that show about me?”

One simple way to teach that shift is the WHO method:

• What did you do?
• How did you do it?
• Outcome: What was the result?

This framework helps students move beyond passive descriptions and start writing bullet points that communicate action, skills, and results.

Format is Important

Even strong content can get overlooked if a resume is difficult to scan. Students often approach resumes as writing assignments. They want to explain everything they’ve done, so they fill the page with long sentences and paragraphs. Employers, however, often begin by scanning a resume for information relevant to the position.

Teaching students about the F-pattern and visual scanning can help them understand why organization, headings, spacing, keywords, and concise bullet points matter. The goal isn’t to turn students into graphic designers. It’s to help them understand that a resume needs to communicate information quickly and make the most relevant information easy to find.

This is another reason why simply handing students a template isn’t enough. A template can provide structure, but students still need to decide what belongs on the page, what deserves emphasis, and how to describe their experiences. Those are career-readiness skills in their own right.

Experience is Bigger Than Employment

Perhaps the most important step happens before a student ever opens a resume template.

We need to help them recognize that experience is more than employment.

For a student who has never had a job, “Tell me about your work experience” can feel like a dead end. Change the question to “Tell me about something you were responsible for,” or “Tell me about a project you contributed to,” and the conversation changes. Suddenly, there is something to work with.

Career preparation can also be part of the broader classroom experience rather than something reserved for a career-readiness course. Students can identify skills through projects, presentations, labs, performances, athletics, clubs, volunteer work, and community involvement, for example:

• English Language Arts: Have students build a resume for a literary character using textual evidence to highlight key skills and accomplishments.
• History: Ask students to create a resume for a historical figure based on historical records, responsibilities, and achievements.
• Science: Guide students in translating lab reports and research projects into resume-ready technical language.
• Career & Technical Education (CTE): Help students turn hands-on, practical projects into descriptions of technical and transferable skills.

These activities give students practice identifying, describing, and communicating career-ready skills even when they have little or no traditional work experience.

Take It Further: The Career Prep Lab

When students struggle with resumes, the answer isn’t necessarily another template. They need opportunities to practice identifying their experiences, understanding what those experiences demonstrate, and communicating that information clearly.

A resume isn’t a list of everything a student has ever done. It’s a way to tell an employer, “Here is what I’ve done, here is what I can do, and here is why it matters.”

That’s the idea behind our Career Prep Lab professional development session.

Rather than simply talking about career readiness, you’ll experience it as a student would. You’ll build a resume, write a cover letter, participate in a mock interview, and create your own professional materials. Then we’ll shift perspectives and look at those same experiences through an educator lens.

We’ll explore strategies for improving auto-generated resumes, help you teach students how employers actually read resumes, and examine ways to build career skills for students with little or no traditional work experience.

You’ll also have dedicated time to begin building or refining lessons that fit your students and your setting, along with practical, ready-to-use resources to support implementation.

Whether you’re a school counselor, career readiness teacher, CTE educator, or classroom teacher looking to bring more meaningful career preparation into your work, the Career Prep Lab is designed to help you move beyond simply having students complete a resume and toward helping them understand what their resume is actually supposed to communicate.

Every student has a story to tell. The real career-readiness skill is learning how to tell it.

This blog post was written by Samantha Jackson, College & Career Readiness Consultant for Kent ISD, and edited by Amanda Walma, T&L Marketing & Communications Specialist for Kent ISD. Images were generated in Canva AI.