Career Services Office
Sections of the CV
Not every element listed below needs to be included in your CV; use your judgment about what will best highlight your strengths and qualifications. Contact information must always be listed at the top of your CV, and the education section usually immediately follows. In general, arrange sections in decreasing order of importance.
Contact Information
Your complete contact information must appear at the top of the first page. Emphasize this information with bold, italics, or a simple horizontal line. Include your full name, address, telephone number, and e-mail address. You may also include a fax number or URL of a professional Web site, if relevant.
Education
The education section is almost always the first section after contact information in the CV. List all institutions, degrees, and graduation dates in reverse chronological order. If you are in the process of completing a degree, indicate your anticipated graduation date. You should indicate the campus if you attended a multi-campus institution (such as the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign). Other possible information to list in this section includes areas of concentration or other activities directly related to your graduate training.
Doctoral students who have completed all degree requirements except the dissertation should emphasize their standing. This can be achieved through the use of the term candidate, or the less formal (but widely used) term, ABD (All But Dissertation). Additionally, you should include your dissertation title and the name of your adviser or committee members. Some disciplines expect a longer description (about a paragraph) of the dissertation to be included on the CV. If this is typical of your field, you may consider placing this information under a separate section entitled "Dissertation Abstract." Consult with your adviser or someone else in your department and follow the norm in your field. You may spell out degree names (i.e., Doctor of Philosophy), but abbreviations are more common and concise. It is acceptable today to abbreviate with or without periods (M.A. or MA), but be consistent in the style you choose.
You have options about how to organize your educational credentials on your CV. If you have multiple degrees from a single institution, for example, you may wish to organize your education section by university name, as in sample 1. Some students wish to deemphasize small institutions that they fear lack prestige. In this case, the CV may be set up to accentuate the degree name and major first, as in sample 2.
Experience
In this section, include all experiences relevant to your professional objectives, including teaching, advising, research, and scholarly service. You may wish to subdivide into multiple sections in order to best present your skills and highlight your experiences (with heading titles such as "Teaching Experience," "Teaching and Advising Experience," "Professional Experience," "Research Experience," "Employment Experience" or "Administrative Experience"). It is appropriate to have discrete sections for teaching and research experience if you have numerous experiences to cite. For each position held, include the name of the institution with which you were associated, position title, your responsibilities and accomplishments, and the dates of employment. Select an appropriate format to use when listing these experiences, and use it consistently.
We recommend that you take the opportunity to define and explain the skills used in these experiences, including the details of the most interesting or impressive aspects of your position. Stress your personal accomplishments and contributions. These types of explanations are certainly optional, and your CV can be complete without them. However, concise, thoughtful explanations of your skills and accomplishments may distinguish you from others in the applicant pool and persuade the reader of your competence. Strong, active verbs are recommended, and you may wish to consult a list of action verbs (PDF). Please note that this type of description is most commonly used in CVs of entry level candidates. CVs of senior faculty provide fewer details, usually providing only a succinct list of achievements. Teaching and research skills and experience are implicit.
If you include a "Teaching Experience" section, you will want to include all full-time, part-time, and adjunct teaching experiences, listing your titles, dates of employment, and the name of each course taught. Since job titles and responsibilities vary by institution and even discipline, you may want to include a brief description of your responsibilities, including your level of involvement in the course design, preparation of materials, weekly instruction, and grading.
Under "Research Experience" you may include graduate, postdoctoral, and possibly undergraduate and internship research credentials. If you are describing a research project, it is appropriate to give a brief statement indicating your objective and results, as well as listing the affiliated lab and/or professor.
You may wish to use a section like "Professional Experience" to convey experiences that fall outside teaching and research, such as editorial, administrative, or service contributions. See samples 3 - 6.
Professional Training and Experience
If you are applying for a position in a professional school (such as business, law, education, etc.) and have experience working in that profession, provide a detailed description in this section. Also include any specialized training received through your department or a professional organization, such as courses on pedagogy or teaching techniques, professional seminars, or technical/computer training. See sample 7.
Publications
Include bibliographic citations of published articles, research reports, and book reviews in this section. If applicable, you may also include public creative works such as poems, musical performances, or art exhibits. Only scholarly publications should be included in the CV. As your list grows, you may separate these items into subcategories such as "Book Reviews," "Articles in Refereed Journals," "Books," etc. Be aware of prestige hierarchies and organize your subsections accordingly, with refereed articles at the top of your list. When a list of publications is lengthy, it is usually placed at the end of the CV.
If you have confirmation from a publisher that an article has been accepted and will soon be released, it is acceptable to list it as a publication and label it "forthcoming." In some fields, it is standard practice to also include works that are "in progress" or "under review." Use a citation format that is appropriate for your discipline. Samples 8 and 9 are consistent with anthropological and engineering citation styles, respectively.
Presentations
List all papers and talks you have given, or will deliver, along with the names, dates, and locations of the corresponding conferences or meetings. Use the documentation style consistent with your discipline. Sample 10 is from anthropology.
Professional Affiliations, Academic Service, and Community Outreach
Your CV should list the scholarly organizations in which you currently participate and should inventory academic services you have provided to your campus and scholarly community. Depending upon your experience, you may have one simple section or, if you have been an active participant in national organizations and campus committees, you may have multiple sections. Appropriate headings may include "Professional Affiliations," "Scholarly Memberships," "Academic Service," "Professional Service," "Scholarly Service," "University Service," or "Community Engagement."
If you have served on any committees (such as advisory or search committee in your department or any appointed or elected positions in the university), list these experiences here. You may also note talks you gave, meetings you arranged, or conferences you moderated at your university about professional issues in your field. If you volunteered your time in other ways related to your discipline within the community (judging a science fair, volunteering at a museum, etc.), you may list these activities here. See samples 11-14.
Awards, Fellowships, Honors, Grants
List all relevant academic distinctions that you have received since entering graduate school, including teaching awards, fellowships, honors, and grants. You may also include prominent undergraduate awards. You may also want to include undergraduate honors or fellowships if they are relevant to your field. Include the name of the department or the institution that honored you with the award. Commonly known honors (such as Phi Beta Kappa, etc.) need no explanation, but less familiar awards should be briefly explained (for example "One of three selected from among 200 English graduate students."). If you have received a grant from an outside organization, list the funding agency and the project for which the grant was awarded. Occasionally a grant will appear in two sections of the CV: it may be listed briefly in this section and the work it supported discussed in further detail under the experience section. See samples 15 and 16.
Languages
When relevant, list the languages you have studied, as well as some indication of your level of expertise. See sample 17.
Research Interest
This category allows you to describe your future research plans. Interests listed in this section should be described at a level that is specific enough to be credible but is general enough to allow for flexibility over the next several years in case your focus changes. Be prepared to discuss in detail anything you include in this section. See samples 18 and 19.
Courses Taken
It is often advantageous to include a section listing relevant courses taken, particularly for fellowship applications. This section can help demonstrate your experience and fitness for the fellowship award. The list of relevant courses may be basic, merely indicating the topics of courses taken over your academic career, as in sample 20. You may also wish to list the course number, term taken, and institution name (as in sample 21). This section is usually not included in CVs used for job applications.
Additional Information or Sections, as Relevant
Depending upon your background, experiences, and area of study, you may wish to include sections that are not typically included in the standard CV but that are entirely appropriate for your discipline or experience. Such sections may include "Fieldwork Experience," "Technical Skills," "Performance Experience," "List of Compositions," "Additional Information," and many others. Students in the performing arts often spend much of their time creating and performing, rather than writing and publishing. They should add sections that appropriately demonstrate their accomplishments, such as "Performances," "Master Classes and Private Instruction," "Selected Chamber Music and Solo Experience," "Orchestra Experience," "Competitions," "Music Festivals," "Creative Works," "Exhibits," "Recitals," etc.
The title "Additional Information" may include miscellaneous information that does not fit elsewhere. You may include extensive travel, interests that you feel are important, and any previous jobs not included under "Experience." It is not recommended that you include information about your date of birth, marital status or other personal information. If anything about your CV could cause an employer to question your authorization to work in the United States, you may wish to indicate your U.S. citizenship or permanent residency, if you have it. If you do not have either of these, you may want to make the most positive statement you have about work eligibility, such as "Visa status allows 18 month United States work permission." See samples 22-24.
References
At the end of your CV, list the names, titles, and academic affiliations of your references. Providing the telephone numbers and e-mail addresses of these references is strongly recommended, although complete mailing addresses are not necessary. See sample 25.
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