Curriculum Vitae (Latin the courses of my life) or CV
CV is essentially an unlimited number of page vs a resume (which is usually only 1-2 pages). It allows you to tell us a bit more detail about the experiences that you have had up to this point.
Below are some notes about Resumes vs CVs to guide you. Please also check out the example CV and the CV template which you are welcome to use.
Resume vs CV
In the US – Resume for most jobs outside of science and academia. CV for doctors, lawyers (some), scientific industry (pharmaceutics), academia (e.g. professors, technicians, etc), undergraduate research programs.
When you are writing a CV or resume think about the following
- Your audience
- The position
- Your strengths, relevant skills & experience
- How much detail
Resumes
- Usually 1-2 pages
- Summary or objective statement?
- Publications as addendum (if at all)
- Emphasize skills/experiences most relevant to the reader and position
- Do not include work/lab address
- Do not include references
Format for CV
- There is no single correct format
- Highlight your strengths, accomplishments, and experience
- Strongest qualities should stand out when skimmed
- 30 second test
- Enough supporting detail to stand up to scrutiny
- Oragnize with Categories
- Arrange categories in order of importance
- Reverse chronological order within categories
Style for CV
- Place most important information:
- First page
- Left side of page
- Beginning of sections
- In columns
- Use emphasis (i.e. bold/underline) judiciously
- Use action verbs to describe experience
- Consult job/proposal posting, and include relevant KEYWORDS
- Avoid pronouns, articles, jargon
- Use sentence fragments
- PROOF, PROOF, PROOF
- Ask a friend to PROOF
Common Mistakes
- Avoid “TOO MANY WORDS”
- Don’t include PERSONAL information, e.g.
- Marital status, Gender
- Date of birth, Photograph
- Citizenship (unless requested), Native country, language (unless relevant to position)
- Be very careful attributing pre-published papers
- Don’t get too creative with paper, style, format
Other tips for CV’s
- Keep a master CV that has so much info that you would never give it to anyone. It is easier to take this CV and narrow/format it for a specific job.
- Keep a “master CV” that has the following:
- Education (where, how long, what did you study (major classes), GPA, class rank, major awards (valedictorian)
- Scientific Work (paid and volunteer)
- For each position list institution, dates worked, position title, boss (PI – Primary investigator), major area of expertise (use sentence fragments to describe your research and major methods)
- Peer-reviewed publications
- For each publication list entire author names and all details of publication.
- Poster presentations
- For each poster list entire author names, title, where it was presented and/or published.
- Oral presentations
- List what the presentation was for along with title, number in the audience etc
- Techniques
- List of all of the techniques that you have experience with. These can be sub-divided based on your experience with various techniques.
- Leadership experience
- Here is where you keep a list of all of the committees that you have served on, the organizations that you are a member of etc
- Affiliations
- List professional affiliations including date start affiliation
- Media
- Write down when you were in the local paper
- Awards
- List everything from college and beyond (exceptions: If you are early in college it is okay to list high school accomplishments; If you are old it is okay to list a couple of major high school accomplishments (e.g. valedictorian, Eagle Scout or Arrow of Light (depends on app), National Spelling Bee chamption, etc) but don’t overdue it.
Specialized CVs that are Used in Science (you don’t need to do these now)
- NIH Biosketch – Needed for all NIH grants
- NSF Biosketch – Needed for all NSF grants (Scroll down to section C.2.f for details)