Triton Mindset Blog

Experiential Learning: Tips for Resume Building

Submitted By: Mike Zucker - Associate Director of Career Development and Industry Engagement for the UC San Diego Career Center

Date: 5/20/2024

Key Take-Aways: 

• Any experience (academic assignments/projects, lab research, volunteerism, student employment) is an experience that you can and should market to present as qualified for positions of which you have interest
• Employers do not have a standard definition for how they define experience
• Rather than experience, it is qualifications that are most influential in how a candidate is evaluated
• Recent graduates can more effectively present as qualified if they understand how to market the skills and results garnered from any experience
• Effectively presenting and marketing your candidacy is an important element in the equation of avoiding underemployment 
   

Hello, Tritons! Congratulations on getting to this point in the Spring 2024 quarter. With finals just around the corner, and all of the necessary preparations underway, what better time to author the most recent Triton Mindset Blog entry? So, thanks for spending some time with us.

As I have mentioned previously, many misconceptions impact college students and recent graduates as they navigate their career planning and decision-making—an example. Networking – have to do it, incredibly important, but nobody tells us (students and recent graduates) what it means, how to do it, fundamental guidelines, etc. Another of the major misconceptions that serve as an obstacle for recent graduates is the daunting challenge that we get beat over the head with as college students – “you have to get experience”. Finger wag, finger wag. Students hear that, and as have expressed in our appointments, share the valid concern that is “nobody will hire me to get experience, so how can I gain experience?”

This is where the misconception that “experience” only counts if you get paid for it. This is where the misconception that “what happens in the classroom, group work, and laboratories cannot be on a resume”. This is where the misconception that I – as merely a college student – do not have “experience” to market to employers - must be challenged and overcome. However, it is one thing to hear what higher ed/career services professionals have to say about gaining experience, it is another to hear how the individuals conducting the screening/hiring view the concept of experience. This led me to set out on a quest to research the concept of “how do employers define experience?”. Guess what I found? Nothing. No articles, tips, insights, posts. You will get hit after hit about the hiring experience, but not how those that hire define experience.

So, I went in another direction. After all, we are trying to help students and recent graduates understand that when they market themselves to a given role/opportunity/program/internship they can leverage any experience to present as qualified. This leads me to research how employers define qualifications.

Here is what I found – From a 2019 Piece on Chron.com – “Qualifications include the education, experience, skills, and personal qualities you bring to the table. Examples of qualifications include: college degree, license, excellent communication skills, ability to lift 50 pounds, attention to detail, commitment to diversity, dependability, and a positive attitude.” From the National Center for Vocational Education and Research (NCVER), “Respondents made a strong distinction between qualifications and experience, the latter being more valued across a wider number and type of business circumstances. Often, the skills most valued are ‘employability skills’ (such as attitude, language and literacy, communication abilities and teamwork)” [What Value Do Employers Give to Qualifications, NCVER, Australia National Training Authority, 2009]. A piece by the Indeed Editorial Team from August 2023, entitled “Qualifications vs. Skills”, offered “having certain skills is often a qualification for a role, but not all qualifications are skills.”

Next, I wanted to look at the formal definition of Experiential Learning. In short – it is (obviously) the process of learning by doing. In theory, to be as marketable as we can, to make the most of our collegiate experience, we should complement our classroom and academic knowledge with application of what we are learning while leveraging this applied learning to develop an array of skills – role specific (example: technical skill such as Data Analysis) soft (example: collaboration), and self-management (example: the ability to navigate ambiguity) – that combined enhance our ability to present as qualified for a role.

We meet with many students who have valuable, experiential learning endeavors buried in a listing of activities, that assume they cannot include academics, that discount all of the skills and experience from leadership roles or community involvements. This is one of the reasons underemployment is so rampant among recent graduates. We discount effectively marketing our experiences and associated skills. Let me repeat. We (as recent graduates) discount effectively marketing our experiences and associated skills.

Some of you have these endeavors to pull from when presenting your candidacy and others may be trying to better grasp – what can I do to gain experience?

The primary idea hope you take from this piece is that all of your diverse experiences, past or prospective – from (perceived to be) non-related part-time jobs, to leadership roles in student organizations, to academic projects, to course assignments, to community service, to mentorship programs, to social service/volunteerism, to extracurriculars, to performance, athletics, and creating art. All of these represent experiences for you to develop applied skills – be they role-specific, soft, or self-management, which you can (and should), in turn, market as qualifications for the role you are targeting. Experience does not have to come from paid, related, previous employment experience.

Any learning is experience. Hence, experiential learning.

The trick is to market those experiences and associated skills strategically. Career Centers all around the globe are equipped to help with this important component of your job search and effective transition from college graduate to successful career professional (and proud alumnus).

Mike Zucker: Associate Director of Career Development and Industry Engagement for the UC San Diego Career Center

Follow me on LinkedIn

Mike Zucker is a proud two-time graduate of the University of Texas at San Antonio with a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology and a Master of Arts in Counseling. Mike is a dedicated and enthusiastic Career Services professional with over 18 years of experience working in a large public university serving college students to identify and address their career planning, experiential learning, and career readiness needs. In his spare time, Mike enjoys playing golf, is an avid swimmer, is a youth basketball coach, and has terrible luck in fantasy football. Mike began his time at the UC San Diego Career Center as an Associated Director in 2021.