High school student resume examples
The first sample is a junior applying for a weekend job with no paid work yet; the second is a sample resume for a high school student who has just graduated and has two summer jobs. Every name, place and number is made up: use them for the shape, then put your own facts in.
Maya Okafor
High School Junior · Seeking part-time work
maya.okafor@example.com | (555) 010-0000 | Columbus, OH
Objective
- Reliable high school junior seeking a part-time cashier or sales role on weekends and weekday evenings, bringing a year of library volunteering and two years of babysitting.
Education
- Example High School, Columbus, OH · Expected graduation June 2028 · GPA 3.6
- Relevant courses: Business Math, Spanish II, Computer Applications
Experience
- Volunteer, Example Public Library, Columbus · Jun 2025 – Present
- • Help about 40 children a week sign up for the summer reading program; keep the sign-up sheet in Google Sheets.
- • Shelve and check in returns; trusted to open the children's section on Saturdays.
- Babysitter (self-employed), Columbus · 2024 – Present
- • Care for 3 children from two families after school, including homework help and meals.
Activities
- Varsity soccer, 2 seasons; team treasurer (tracked $1,200 in fundraising)
- Key Club member: organized a coat drive that collected 150 coats
Skills
- Customer service · Cash handling (team fundraising) · Google Workspace and Microsoft Word · Spanish (conversational) · Available weekends
Notice that the junior has never had a payroll job, and the resume still has an Experience section: volunteering and babysitting are real experience, written the same way a job would be.
High school resume template (copy it into Google Docs or Word)
Use this table as your high school student resume template: in Google Docs or Word, type the six headings in this order, one column, and fill each with the content in the middle column. CVEmber's Google Docs resume templates page shows which layouts stay readable when you download them as a Word file or PDF.
| Section | What goes in it | Tip |
|---|---|---|
| Contact | Name, phone, a plain email (firstname.lastname@…), city and state | No home address needed; no photo in the US |
| Objective | One sentence: the job you want and what you bring | Name the job: “part-time cashier”, not “any position” |
| Education | School, city, expected graduation date; GPA if it helps you, or if the employer asks | Honors, AP courses and relevant classes go here |
| Experience | Paid jobs, informal work (babysitting, lawn care, tutoring), volunteering | Title, place, dates, then 1-3 bullets |
| Activities | Sports, clubs, band, student council, scouts | Add a role or result: captain, treasurer, raised $X |
| Skills | Software, languages, practical skills, availability | Only what you could show on day one |
Keep it to one page with standard headings. That is also what hiring software reads best (see ATS-friendly templates). Use the order that puts your strongest section first: education when you have little else, experience once you have a job or a long volunteer role.
Resume for a high school student with no work experience
The UK's National Careers Service advises that for a first job “you can focus on skills you've learned through projects, work experience or volunteering.” Canada's Job Bank encourages young people to build experience through volunteering and internships. On a resume for a high school student, that means:
- Informal jobs: babysitting, pet-sitting, lawn mowing, tutoring younger students, helping in a family business.
- Volunteering: libraries, food banks, animal shelters, places of worship, community events, school open houses.
- Sports and clubs, especially with a role: captain, treasurer, organizer.
- School projects and competitions: science fairs, robotics, debate, Model UN, a business-class project.
- Things you made: a website, a YouTube channel, artwork, a small online shop.
- Awards and certificates: honor roll, first aid or CPR, a lifeguard certificate, a typing or coding certificate.
For more on turning these into a resume, see how to make a resume for your first job.
What changes at 14, 15, 16 and 17
The resume's shape stays the same; what you can put in it grows, and so does the kind of job you can apply for.
- At 14 and 15: in the US, federal rules allow retail, food service, office and errand work, with limits on hours: no more than 3 hours on a school day, 18 hours in a school week, 8 hours on a non-school day and 40 hours in a non-school week, and only between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. (9 p.m. from June 1 to Labor Day), according to the US Department of Labor. Your resume will lean on school, volunteering and informal work, and should state your availability inside those hours. Check your state's rules as well.
- At 16: the Department of Labor says 16- and 17-year-olds “can be employed for unlimited hours in any occupation other than those declared hazardous”, so after-school and weekend shifts open up. Add any first job, even a short summer one, at the top of Experience.
- At 17: you may have a year or two of part-time work. Lead with it, add a result to each job (“trained 2 new cashiers”), and start a version of the resume for college applications or internships.
- At 18: the Department of Labor's youth restrictions end (“once you turn 18 years old, these restrictions no longer apply”). Your resume becomes a graduate's: see the entry-level resume format.
Writing the bullets
Start each bullet with an action verb (Job Bank suggests simple ones such as handled, managed, led and developed), say what you did, and add a number if one is true. Illustrative before and after:
| Weak | Strong (illustrative) |
|---|---|
| Babysitting. | Cared for 2 children, ages 5 and 8, three afternoons a week for a year; helped with homework and made dinner. |
| Was on the soccer team. | Played varsity soccer for 2 seasons; as treasurer, tracked $1,200 of team fundraising in a spreadsheet. |
| Volunteered at a food bank. | Packed about 200 food boxes a month at a local food bank; trained 3 new student volunteers. |
| Mowed lawns. | Ran a summer lawn-care service for 8 neighborhood clients; scheduled jobs and handled payments. |
| Did a science project. | Built a water-quality sensor with a partner; placed third of 60 entries at the county science fair. |
A high school graduate resume
Once you have your diploma, two things change. Experience moves above Education, because a summer job now says more than your GPA, and the Education line shows the diploma and the month you finished instead of an expected date. The objective becomes a short summary of what you have done. The second example shows the result:
Tessa Brandt
High School Graduate · Two summers of food service
tessa.brandt@example.com | (555) 010-0001 | Tucson, AZ
Summary
- Recent high school graduate with two summers of counter work at a busy café and a CPR certificate, looking for a full-time front-desk or customer service role.
Experience
- Counter Server, a neighborhood café, Tucson · Summers 2025 and 2026
- • Took orders and payments for about 150 customers a shift; balanced the register at close with no shortages all summer.
- • Trained 2 new summer hires on the register and the opening checklist.
- Volunteer, a community food bank, Tucson · 2024 – 2026
- • Packed about 200 food boxes a month and ran the Saturday sign-in table.
Education
- High School Diploma, Example High School, Tucson, AZ · May 2026 · GPA 3.2
Certifications and skills
- CPR and First Aid (current) · Cash handling · Square POS · Microsoft Excel · Bilingual English and Spanish
Every claim in the summary (two summers of counter work, the CPR certificate) appears again lower down, so a manager can check it in seconds.
How to put high school on a resume, and whether you should
Should you put high school on a resume, and do you put high school on a resume after college starts? Yes while it is your highest education: a high school student, a recent graduate or anyone who has not started college lists it. Once you have a degree or are in one, usually not, unless the high school detail is outstanding and relevant. To list high school, give the school, the city, your expected or actual graduation year, and one or two honors; a GPA goes in only if it is strong. The same entry fits a resume template for high school students in Google Docs or Word, provided you keep one column and plain headings.
If you are wondering how to make a resume as a high school student with no experience, build it from school activities, volunteering, clubs, sports and any informal work such as babysitting or lawn care, written as jobs. A resume for a high school student with no experience can still run to a full page that a first employer will read; the section above shows what to include.
A resume for college applications
Many college applications, scholarships and summer programs ask for a resume or an activities list. Use the same one-page layout, with three changes: drop the job objective (or replace it with your intended field of study); move education to the top with your coursework, test scores and honors; and give more space to sustained activities, leadership and achievements, with the hours or years you spent on each. Follow any format the application itself sets.
Skills to list on a student resume
- Software: Microsoft Word and Excel, Google Docs and Sheets, Canva, any coding language you have used in a project.
- Languages, with your level: “Spanish (conversational)”.
- Practical skills: cash handling, food safety, first aid or CPR (if certified), typing speed.
- Soft skills the job posting asks for (reliability, teamwork, customer service), each one proven in a bullet above. See soft skills for a resume.
- Availability: the days and hours you can work. For a part-time job it is one of the first things a manager checks.
Common mistakes on a first resume
- An email address from middle school. Make a plain one with your name.
- Listing middle school. It is unnecessary once you are in high school.
- Personal details: age, height, religion. Canada's Job Bank lists them among the details to leave off a resume; the employer only needs to know you are old enough for the job.
- Two pages. One is plenty; cut the weakest activity first.
- A fancy layout. Columns, icons and skill bars confuse hiring software. A clean one-column page reads better everywhere.
- No proofreading. Ask a teacher, a parent or a school counselor to read it before you send it.
Applying with a cover letter? A short one helps when you have little experience: see how to write a cover letter.
If you are 14 to 19 and looking for your first part-time job, the teen resume examples add three full samples and the federal hours limits for 14- and 15-year-olds.
Sources
Checked on 5 October 2026.