High School Resume: Examples for Jobs, College, and Scholarships

Writing a high school resume feels strange when you've never had a "real" job. The template asks for work experience, and you've got a part-time babysitting gig, a club, and a sport. That's fine. Nobody reading a teen's resume expects a career. They want evidence that you're reliable, that you follow through, and that you've done something with your time.

Your high school resume can do three different jobs: get you hired for a first job, support a college or program application, and win scholarships. Each reader looks for slightly different things, so you'll keep one master version and adjust it.

This guide shows you what to include, how to write entries when you have no work history, and how to tailor the page for each purpose. You'll get three complete examples, a skills table, and the federal rules on teen work hours you should know before listing your availability.

When you need a high school resume#

You may need a resume sooner than you think. Common reasons include:

• A first part-time or summer job, especially at larger employers with online applications.
• Scholarship applications that ask for a list of activities and accomplishments.
• College applications or interviews at schools or programs that accept a resume.
• Summer programs, internships, and pre-college camps with competitive admissions.
• Recommendation letter requests, so teachers and counselors have specifics to write about.
• Volunteer roles at hospitals, museums, and nonprofits that screen applicants.

Who reads it and what they look for#

Each reader has a different question in mind. Here's how to set your emphasis.

The College Foundation of North Carolina's resume guide notes that most colleges don't accept resumes, though some highly selective schools may request one, and many scholarships do ask for a resume. It also suggests reordering sections for each purpose, such as leading with education for colleges or with volunteering for scholarships.

What to put on a high school resume#

A high school resume uses the same basic structure as any resume, with more room given to school and activities. Here are the sections to consider, in a typical order.

You don't need every section. Leave out anything empty rather than writing "N/A." If you have more activities than space, keep the ones with the most responsibility or time commitment.

How to write a high school resume, step by step#

Follow this order. Drafting everything first and trimming later is faster than trying to write a perfect page in one pass.

1. Brainstorm a master list of everything since ninth grade: classes, clubs, sports, jobs, chores with responsibility, volunteering, awards, and skills.
2. Add details to each item: dates, hours per week, your role, and any numbers.
3. Choose the version you're writing (job, college, or scholarship).
4. Write your contact information and education.
5. Write experience and activity entries with action verbs and specifics.
6. Add skills, certifications, and awards.
7. Add a short objective if you're applying for a job or program.
8. Cut to one page, removing the least relevant and oldest items first.
9. Ask a parent, teacher, or counselor to proofread.

Contact information#

Put your full name at the top in a slightly larger font. Under it, list your phone number, email address, and city and state. You don't need a full street address.

Objective#

For a job or program application, a one- or two-sentence objective tells the reader what you're looking for and what you bring. Make it specific to the role.

Skip the objective on a college resume, where your activities and essays already explain your goals. The resume objective generator can draft a few versions if you're stuck, and our resume objective examples show more patterns.

Education#

List your school's name, city and state, and expected graduation month and year. Add GPA if it helps you, with the scale, and note whether it's weighted or unweighted. You can also list honors programs, AP or IB courses, and dual-enrollment college classes.

For more on when GPA helps and when to leave it off, see should you put your GPA on your resume. For picking courses, see our guide on relevant coursework on a resume.

Experience, including informal jobs#

Paid jobs come first, but informal work counts too. Babysitting, pet sitting, tutoring, lawn care, snow shoveling, and helping in a family business all show that someone trusted you with real responsibility. Give each one a clear title, a dates line, and one or two bullets.

Activities, leadership, and volunteering#

For most students, this is the heart of the page. List each activity with your role, the organization, dates, and one or two bullets describing what you did. If you held a leadership role, say what you changed or achieved. Our guides to extracurricular activities on a resume and volunteer experience on a resume go deeper on formatting.

Honors, awards, skills, and certifications#

Include awards with the year and level, such as school, district, state, or national. Add concrete skills like Google Docs, Canva, video editing, or a second language, and certifications like CPR, first aid, lifeguard, or a food handler card. Our awards on a resume guide covers how to describe them.

How to write strong entries with no work experience#

The difference between a forgettable high school resume and a strong one is usually the wording. Most teens list what they belonged to. Better resumes show what they did.

Use this pattern for each bullet: action verb + what you did + a number or result. Numbers are easier to find than you think: hours, people, dollars, items, events, games, or grades.

Before-and-after rewrites#

The resume bullet point generator can turn a plain description into a few stronger options you can edit.

What to count when you've never had a job#

Sample bullets for common high school activities#

Most students have a mix of the same handful of activities. Here's how to describe each one so it reads as experience rather than membership. Swap in your own numbers.

Sports#

Coaches and employers both read athletics as evidence of commitment and teamwork. Mention seasons played, positions, captaincy, and anything you did beyond showing up.

Arts, music, and theater#

Rehearsals, performances, and productions involve deadlines, coordination, and practice discipline. Say what you produced and for whom.

Student government and clubs#

Officer roles let you show planning, budgeting, and persuasion. Focus on what changed because you held the role.

Family responsibilities#

Caring for siblings, helping a relative, or working in a family business are real responsibilities. If they take significant time each week, they belong on your resume and explain why you may have fewer clubs.

Personal projects and self-started work#

A YouTube channel, a small online shop, a coding project, or a blog shows initiative because nobody assigned it. Use numbers like subscribers, sales, or users, and name the tools you learned.

High school resume for a first job#

Teens are a large part of the summer workforce. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 21.3 million people ages 16 to 24 were employed in July 2026, up 1.8 million from April. The industries that hired them tell you where most first jobs are.

Leisure and hospitality (restaurants, hotels, recreation) and retail together employed 43% of working youth. Managers hiring for those jobs mostly want to know three things: when you can work, whether you'll show up, and whether you're good with people.

What first-job managers care about#

• Availability: Days and hours you can work, especially evenings and weekends.
• Reliability: Evidence that you commit to things, like a sport or long-running volunteer role.
• Customer skills: Any experience dealing with the public, children, or teammates.
• Transportation: Whether you can get to work on time. You can note "Reliable transportation" in your skills or objective.
• Basic math and money handling: Treasurer roles, fundraisers, or a family business.

For more on proving people skills, see our guide to customer service skills.

Know the hour rules before you list availability#

If you're 14 or 15, federal law limits when you can work. List availability that fits within these limits, or employers may not be able to schedule you. The U.S. Department of Labor's Fact Sheet #43 sets these limits for nonagricultural jobs:

Federal law doesn't limit hours for 16- and 17-year-olds, but many states do. When both apply, the stricter rule governs, so check your state's labor department before you list late-night availability.

What common first jobs pay#

Pay varies by state and employer, but BLS data gives a useful benchmark. These are national median hourly wages for common entry-level food service roles in May 2025, from the Occupational Outlook Handbook.

For comparison, BLS reports a May 2025 median of $15.81 an hour for cashiers and $17.10 for retail sales workers. These are medians for all workers in those occupations, not just teens, so starting pay may be lower.

Sample first-job resume#

High school resume for college applications#

Most colleges collect your activities through the application itself rather than a resume. The Common App, for example, lets you list up to ten activities, and it notes you don't need to fill all ten. Each entry has tight character limits, and you report hours per week and weeks per year separately.

Turning your resume into application activity entries#

A good resume makes the activities section much easier, because you've already written short, specific descriptions. You'll just compress them.

Because time is reported in its own fields, cut hours and dates from the description and use the space for what you did.

When colleges and programs want an actual resume#

Some selective schools, honors colleges, scholarship programs, and alumni interviewers ask for or accept a resume. A college resume can be a bit more detailed than a job resume. Austin ISD's guide, for example, describes a college and scholarship format that can run front and back, plus a longer expanded version used only when a program allows more detail.

Lead with education, then group activities by type (academic, arts, athletics, service, work) or by importance. Show progression over time, such as moving from member to officer.

Use your resume when asking for recommendations#

Teachers and counselors write better letters when they know what you've done outside their class. Give them a copy of your resume when you ask. CFNC recommends this too. For how to ask, see our guide on how to ask for a letter of recommendation.

Sample college resume#

High school resume for scholarships#

Scholarship committees review many applicants against specific criteria. Read the award description first and adjust your resume so the criteria are easy to find.

Match your resume to the scholarship's criteria#

Add a short goals line#

Many scholarships care about where you're headed. A one-line objective that names your intended major and goal connects your activities to the award's purpose. Keep it factual and specific: "Planning to study nursing at a public university and work in rural community health."

If the application also asks for an essay, our personal statement examples show how to connect your experiences to your goals without repeating your resume.

Sample scholarship resume#

This example targets a community service scholarship, so volunteer work moves to the top and total hours are easy to spot.

High school resume for internships and summer programs#

Competitive summer programs, research camps, and the occasional high school internship read your resume differently. They want to see interest in the subject and some preparation, not just general responsibility.

What to change for this version#

• Lead with education, including the courses most related to the program's subject.
• Group related activities under a heading like "STEM Activities" or "Writing and Media" so the reviewer sees your interest at a glance.
• Add projects, even small ones: a science fair entry, a short film, a coding project, or a research paper.
• Write an objective that names the program and what you hope to learn or build.
• Cut unrelated items to make room, while keeping one or two that show reliability, like a job or long-term volunteer role.

Should you send a cover letter?#

If the program or employer accepts one, yes. A short letter of three paragraphs explains why you want this specific opportunity, which a resume can't do. Name the program, connect one or two experiences to it, and give your availability. Our guide to a cover letter with no experience shows how to write one when your work history is thin. Later, when you're in college, our step-by-step plan on how to get an internship covers timelines and where to look.

High school resume format and design#

Your format should be clean and easy to scan. Fancy designs rarely help, and online job applications may parse them badly.

• Length: One page for jobs. One page, sometimes front and back, for college and scholarships.
• Font: A plain font like Calibri, Arial, or Georgia at 10.5 to 12 points.
• Margins: About 0.5 to 1 inch on each side.
• Headings: Bold, clearly labeled sections in a consistent style.
• Order: Most recent first within each section.
• File: Save as a PDF named Firstname-Lastname-Resume.pdf unless told otherwise.

If you're starting from scratch, Resume Maker has a library of sample resumes and four one-page, ATS-friendly templates (Classic, Modern, Compact, and Minimal) you can download as a PDF.

Formatting dates and ongoing activities#

Use months and years for jobs ("June 2025 – Present") and school years or seasons for activities ("2024 – Present" or "Fall 2025"). Be consistent. If an activity spans all four years, a range like "9th – 12th grade" also works on a college resume.

Skills to put on a high school resume#

Teens often list vague traits like "hardworking." Pair every soft skill with a place you've used it, and list concrete hard skills by name.

If you're not sure which skills fit a job, the resume skills generator suggests a role-specific list to choose from. For more on choosing and proving skills, see our skills section guide and our list of soft skills for a resume.

Quick certifications that help teens#

A few certifications can make a first-job resume stand out because they show initiative and reduce training for the employer:

• CPR and first aid, often offered by local organizations
• Lifeguard certification for pool and camp jobs
• Food handler card, required for food service in some areas
• Babysitting or childcare safety courses
• Microsoft Office or Google tool certifications for office roles

Common high school resume mistakes#

Most problems on teen resumes are easy to fix once you know to look for them.

For more on reference pages, see our guide to references on a resume.

When to move high school off your resume#

A high school resume is temporary. As you add college and work experience, high school details should shrink and eventually disappear.

When you reach college, our college student resume guide covers what replaces high school entries. When you start applying for internships, see our internship resume guide.

Listing a diploma or GED as an adult#

If high school is your highest level of education, keep a simple line in your education section: school name, city and state, and "High School Diploma" with the year. For a GED, list "GED" or "High School Equivalency Diploma" with the year and issuing state. Skip GPA and activities once you have work experience.

Next steps: finish your high school resume#

Start with a list, not a template. Gather every activity, job, and award since ninth grade, then write the version you need right now. Before you send it, check these items.

• Personal, professional email address at the top
• Expected graduation month and year in your education section
• Every activity shows your role and at least one specific result or number
• Informal jobs like babysitting have clear titles and dates
• Availability fits the legal hour limits for your age and state
• One page, consistent formatting, saved as a PDF
• Proofread by a parent, teacher, or counselor
• References prepared on a separate page, with permission

Austin ISD recommends updating your resume every semester, and that habit pays off. Each update takes ten minutes, and by senior year your college and scholarship applications will mostly write themselves. If you're applying for jobs with no work history at all, our resume with no experience guide has more ideas, and the accomplishments generator can help you turn everyday wins into strong entries.