Age discrimination is usually reserved for job applicants decades out of college, but even those on the younger side of the job hunt may also be targets. Job seekers of all ages have started adopting the practice of omitting their college graduation date from their résumés to keep their exact ages a secret.
Some older workers are taking this a step further by eliminating their earliest work experience. The overall idea from both sides is to let the job experience speak for itself without an employer knowing precisely when you were 22. Recent college graduates, however, should include their graduation year to give reason for any lack of experience.
on Yahoo! |
















It doesn't help that so many people still put their Education section at the very top of their resumes -- even people who have been in the working world for decades.
I can't understand the mentality there. No matter where you went to school, your work experience is vastly more important once you've had a couple of jobs in your chosen profession. When you've first graduated, sure, list your college info at the top of your resume, and bury your work experience at Subway and the campus bookstore below that. But as soon as you have relevant work experience, move that to the top, most recent first, and put the Education section after *all* of your work experience.
I've struggled in recent years to keep my resume to a clean two pages (and I have an even leaner one page version), and I'm only 27. My "Summary of Qualifications" goes at the top, followed by Professional Experience starting with my most recent, down to the oldest work experience, which was my first industry job when I was 18, with the last few jobs pared down to one sentence. Then Additional Experience, covering non-professional but still applicable experience. And only *then*, at the bottom of page 2, do I list my Education, and again, I keep it very brief.
My experience has been that with my professional credentials front and center, that's what potential employers talk to me about during interviews, not what classes I took in college, much less the year I graduated. Which is as it should be: they're hiring me for my most recent work experience, not the Sociology classes I took a decade ago.