CV Workshop - 'Education' heading

If this is the first time you are viewing this blog series, please refer back to the first summary post called ‘CV Workshop – Top 5 Headings for your CV’.

A compulsory aspect of your CV is to include all your educational qualifications; these will be ranging from GCSE’s, A-Level’s and Degree(s) or equivalent. So, your education section will be one of the first things the employer will look at. Therefore, I’ve decided to place the Education section straight beneath the profile section (profile = few lines about yourself and your contact details could go into the header of the doc).  As this is a compulsory part of your CV I’m not going to go into the why, what and how, like I did for the ‘profile’ post as for this heading it’s pretty obvious. Instead, I’m going to give you a few ideas of how you can layout your qualifications in a neat and concise way.

You should always begin your education section with your most recent qualification (predicted or obtained) so, for me, I’d start with ‘University of Surrey: Degree in English Literature predicted 2.1’. On the next lines I would then include my A-level’s, ‘Sir John Lawes School (address): 4 A-Levels English (grade) ICT Double (grade) ICT Single (grade) and Media (grade)’, and so on. Also, I would continue in this format, with every new line signifying my different qualifications – like a list.

Extras: 

After looking at quite a few examples of CV’s, I think it’s a nice touch to include a few modules that you are studying/studied for your degree. For instance, you can extend your initial sentence ‘University of Surrey: Degree in English Literature predicted 2.1, modules include classic realism and its decay, constructing the self and contemporary literature.’

As well, for some added finesse you could indent your sentences on after each school/university name so that your qualifications are indented in the same layout. 

Finally, put your font in bold for all your obtained/predicted qualifications e.g. 2.1 (i've done this above), just so that it is very clear and easily distinguishable for your potential employer.

Once you have listed all your qualifications, the education section is now complete.