Curriculum Vitae

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Contents 1 General Information 1.1 What is the purpose of the CV? 1.2 You should tailor your CV to the specific position for which you are applying 1.3 Sequence of sections can vary 1.4 Sequence of content within each section can vary 1.5 What to do about gaps in your life story? 1.6 How much information should you include on the CV? 1.7 Formatting issues 1.8 Most importantly, show your CV to others before submitting it 2 Top of Vita 3 Education 4 Honors and Awards 5 Professional Experience 6 Research Experience/Interests 7 Teaching Experience 8 Professional Memberships 9 Professional Activities 10 Grants (and Contracts) 11 Publications 12 Conference Publications 13 Colloquia and Workshops 14 References 15 Where can I go to find more information about CV?

General Information

• A Curriculum Vitae (“CV” or “vitae”) is Latin for “the course of one’s life” and is the sum of your academic life.

What is the purpose of the CV?

• The purpose of the vita is to inform.
• The CV is a form of communication. So you need to ask yourself what information about you is relevant to the specific position that you are applying for, and what information about you the reader of the CV would want/need to know.

You should tailor your CV to the specific position for which you are applying

• A research-related position will be interested in different types of information about you compared to a teaching-related position.
• Each position needs to know if you possess the knowledge and skills necessary to accomplish the particular job that is being offered, so tailor your CV to reflect how you fit that position.

Sequence of sections can vary

• Just as the content of the CV should reflect the specific position for which you are applying, the ordering of that information should also reflect what potential employers of that specific position want/need to know about you.
• For example, place research-related information higher on the CV for a research-related job, and place teaching-related information higher on the CV for a teaching-related job.

Sequence of content within each section can vary

• Some people use chronological ordering of information within each section, while others use reverse chronological ordering. Whichever you decide to use, be consistent throughout the CV.
• At the beginning of your career you may want to use reverse chronological ordering because the reader of the CV is probably most interested in what you are currently doing in terms of your employment, research, teaching, etc.

What to do about gaps in your life story?

• There is a difference of opinion on this issue.
• Some believe that you do not want any gaps in your life story because the reader of the CV will wonder what occurred during that time considering that you are not being forthcoming and including that information on the CV.
• Some argue that some gaps are ok as long as they are not significant gaps.
• Some argue that gaps in your life story are acceptable before attaining the Ph.D. or M.A. degree, but not after you obtain these degrees, because the reader of the CV is more interested in what you have done since you graduated from graduate school, not before.

How much information should you include on the CV?

• While you want the CV to be concise and to the point, you want to include as much information as possible that is relevant to the position you are applying for.
• Don’t be humble or shy. The CV is the place where you put your best foot forward.
• Don’t put anything on your CV that you would not want to find on the net.

Formatting issues

• For some special purposes, you will be a given a format to follow (e.g., NIH biosketch).
• The content determines the length of the CV so there are no length restrictions.
• Page numbers should appear on all pages except the first.
• Avoid using fonts size less than 10-point.
• To create a more readable and distinctive CV, you may use indention, bold and italic text, and more than one type of font. But remember to be consistent through the CV.

Most importantly, show your CV to others before submitting it

Top of Vita

• Date of preparation - you want to put the date of preparation on the CV because it tells the reader whether the CV is current or not. Put the date of preparation at the top of the first page.
• Title - while some people like to put the words “Curriculum Vitae” or something similar at the top of the CV, this is not necessary, and some would say its redundant.
• Contact information - if applying for a job, put all possible contact information, such as Name, Office address, fax, phone, email. If not applying for a job, an office address, fax, and phone are unnecessary but helpful.
• In the US avoid personal information such as birthdate, martial status, social security number, home address, etc. In countries outside the US ask colleagues: often it is customary to list your birthdate.
• Unless requested or highly pertinent, usually avoid information such as fluency in another language, computer experience, hobbies, leisure activities, etc.

Education

• List the degree, year, university, major.
• Some people include their dissertation title and advisor.
• Most people list education in reverse chronological order.
• When listing your graduate level degree, tailor it to where you are sending the CV. If you are applying for a specific position, indicate your exact area of study (e.g., Social Psychology, Clinical Psychology, etc). If you are applying to a job outside psychology, its acceptable to simply state your degree as “Psychology”.
• If you are currently a graduate student, provide some type of information for the reader to know where you are in the program, such as listing expected graduation date, or dates you have attended graduate school (e.g., 2003-present). Its not necessary to list what year you are currently in (e.g., 4th year student).

Honors and Awards

• Don’t be humble.
• Don’t bury the truly impressive by too much trivia.
• If you have impressive/prestigious honors and awards, then you may want to place this section near the top/front of the CV. If you are a graduate student or at the beginning of your career, then this section may not contain the number of honors and awards that justifies moving this section closer to the front of the CV.

Professional Experience

• List in reverse chronological order
• Examples of headers include Academic Appointments, Employment, etc
• For graduate students seeking a research-related position, you may want to list out your research experience, such as research assistantships or project coordinator, etc. For information on how to list out your research experience, see the section below about “Research Interests/Experience”.

Research Experience/Interests

• Some people lists their research interests as a separate section on their CV. This may be more important for graduate students or junior researchers would want to communicate their main areas of research focus. This information may be appropriately placed near the top/front of the CV.
• Of those people who provide their research interests, some provide a general indication of their research interests (e.g., Aggression, Empathy, Biological basis of depression, etc), and some provide more detailed lists of their research interests (e.g., paragraph length).
• The specific job/position for which you are applying is a relevant factor when determining the scope and content of the research interests that you are going to provide on your CV.
• Separate from research interests, some people provide information about their research experience, such as the type of research projects they have worked on, under whose direction, and for what length of time, etc.
• Of those people who provide research experience, some combine that information with information about research interests.
• Information about research experience, however, may be unnecessary or redundant because your publications speak to the projects you have worked on in the past and with whom.
• Information about your research interests, on the other hand, is more necessary because this speaks to the projects you want to work on in the future.

Teaching Experience

• Optional section if you want to focus on your teaching abilities.
• If more experienced, list courses taught (list titles, e.g., "Introduction to Social Psychology" not "PS 150" which is school specific).
• If more junior, list courses TA’d, guest lecturers, courses able to teach, etc.

Professional Memberships

• List out the societies or associations for which you are a member.
• Indicate level of membership, e.g., Fellow, Student Member, etc.
• If simply a list of memberships, could come at end of CV.

Professional Activities

• List all professional activities.
• The information can be separated into separate sections as more professional activities accumulate such as Editorial Activities (Reviewer, Ad hoc reviewer), Membership on committees (National level, University level, Department level), Administrative Experience (National administrative experience, University administrative experience, Department administrative experience)

Grants (and Contracts)

• Include these elements in any order: Sponsor, Title of grant, your Role, Years, Amount.
• Can put “pending” or “submitted”.

Publications

• Can do either chronological or reverse chronological but usually not alphabetically or clustered by topic.
• Present in APA style.
• “In Press” – can have separate section if you have many in press articles, otherwise fine to include in list of other publications without separate header.
• “Manuscripts Under Review” – can have this as a separate section. If you do have this section, listing the journal at which it was submitted is optional. It can be embarrassing if said journal does not accept your publication, however.
• “Manuscripts under preparation” or “Manuscript in progress” – can have this as a separate section especially if you are a graduate student or junior researcher, but you do not want to list too many things under this header because it may send the wrong signal that you are not accomplishing/finishing projects.
• As you accumulate more publications, you can have more headings such as Books, Chapters, Journal articles, Technical reports, Newsletter articles, Other Writings…

Conference Publications

• Include all relevant information, such as Authors, Title, Date, Event (e.g., American Psychological Association), and Location of event.
• Present in APA style. The APA style formatting for posters and talks presented at conferences is provided on page 260 (4.16) of the APA Publication Manual.
• Some suggest that the number of posters should not exceed the number of publications because it may send the wrong signal that you work on many projects but can not get them published. This rule of thumb does not apply to talks or symposium at conferences.
• If you have a sufficient number of talks at conferences and other types of invited talks (e.g., colloquia, brownbags, job talks, etc), you may want another separate section about “Invited Talks.”

Colloquia and Workshops

• If you have given talks at colloquia or workshops, you can collapse this information into “Conference Presentations” if there are not that many, or can collapse under “Invited Talks” if you have that section on your CV.
• If you have attended a workshop, you may want to list this information if you were selected/invited for the workshop, or gained a unique skill at the workshop that the reader of the CV would want to know about.
• You could also expand this section to include radio or TV interviews, community presentations, etc.

References

• How many references are standard? Three is the minimum, but more than three is acceptable.
• You want the individuals providing the references to be knowledgeable or familiar enough about you that they can speak to your abilities and skills.

Where can I go to find more information about CV?

• There are many sources on the web for how to craft and format your CV, but the best way is to look at the CV of others in the field, particular those individuals who are currently doing the types of jobs you are seeking to acquire. Many individuals post their CV online at their website of the school/university/workplace which they are affiliated with, and many others post their CV on their personal website.
• I would recommend looking at the CVs from a range of individuals at different stages in their career (e.g., full-time faculty to post-docs) and from a range of different types of workplaces (e.g., research-oriented universities or institutes, 4-year schools, 2-year schools, teaching-only institutions, non-academic workplaces, etc).

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