Writing with Parallel Structure and Telegraphic Style

All similar elements in your résumé should use parallel structure, which means the same grammatical form. For example, each work experience item should list job title, employer, dates of employment, and duties—in that order, with the same punctuation and treatment for each element. By contrast, lists of skills and qualifications might all be adjectives:

Prewriting to Gather Details About Yourself

Before you write your résumé, you should think about your experiences and skills. At this point you don't need to worry about résumé sections or parallel structure or "telegraphic style." You just need to think about what you've learned, and what you have to offer employers. Answering questions can help.

Warm-Up for Résumé Writing

In tribal societies, pretty much everybody has to do everything: hunting, gathering, making tools, building shelters, fetching water, hauling goods, fighting predators, bartering, teaching, learning, and so on. In modern societies, people specialize. Most people don't grow their own wheat or make their own circular saws or build their own houses. Instead, they pay experts who can do these tasks much more effectively and efficiently while meanwhile making money doing something they are experts in.

Your schooling is starting you on the road to becoming an expert in something. Your first few jobs will continue that journey. Just as you've learned a great deal in school, you will learn even more as you work and develop expertise. But how do you build a bridge from the classroom to the workplace? You start by writing an effective résumé.

What Is a Résumé?

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A résumé is a document that helps potential employers understand who you are: your objectives, experience, skills, education, and awards. The word résumé comes from the French "resume," meaning to "take back, assume again, or regain." In other words, when you are writing a résumé, you are regaining all of the experiences you've had that can prepare you to succeed in a new opportunity. Some people also use the term c.v. or curriculum vitae, which means "course of one's life."

Thinking About the Course of Your Life

You began life as a single cell. You now have a trillion of them. That's a lot of change to go through. You can reflect over the long course of your life by completing a time line. For each period, list key experiences, educational influences, and who you became. Here's the course of one student's life.

Revising to Target the Prompt

First, you need to make sure you have answered the prompt. A brilliant essay that talks about rock climbing will not score well when the prompt asked for a definition of leadership. You can use your PAST analysis of the prompt to check your response. Turn each answer into a question, and use them to analyze your response.

• Purpose: Why am I writing? (Do I introduce myself and tell how I will enrich life on campus?)
• Audience: Who will read my writing? (Do I address admissions officers, providing the information they need to know about me?)
• Subject: What am I writing about? (Do I focus on a particular life experience, talent, commitment, or interest I have?)
• Type: What form should my writing take? (Do I compose my answer as an essay?)

Writing to Analyze the Prompt

Before you can write a college-entrance essay, you need to understand what the college wants you to write about and why. Carefully read and analyze the prompt by asking the PAST questions about it:

• Purpose: Why am I writing? (to introduce myself, telling how I will enrich life on campus)
• Audience: Who will read my writing? (admissions officers)
• Subject: What am I writing about? (a particular life experience, talent, commitment, or interest I have)
• Type: What form should my writing take? (an essay)

College-entrance prompt:

• Purpose: Why am I writing?
• Audience: Who will read my writing?
• Subject: What am I writing about?
• Type: What form should my writing take?

Editing Dialogue

One key component of an effective narrative is dialogue—the words people say. Handling dialogue can be tricky.

When two or more people are having a conversation, start a new paragraph whenever you have a new speaker:

Note that a comma separates words like said or asked from the quoted material. A period separates a complete sentence from quoted material.

When one person speaks, or the spoken words are details included in a larger idea, you can embed them in the paragraph.

Place quotation marks before and after quoted material. When periods or commas follow quoted material, always put them inside the close quotation marks. When exclamation points or question marks follow quoted material, place them inside if they punctuate the quotation and outside if they punctuate the whole sentence. Note the correct punctuation in the following dialogue.

Revising for Pace

You can't go into great depth about everything that happened over a few months' time. The essay would turn into an endless novel. Imagine Jake's journey across the Great Plains if he reported every excruciating detail.

On the other hand, you can't tell an effective story if you just gloss over everything. Imagine Jake's whole personal essay rendered that way.

You need to dive into deep detail in an important moment and then provide a quick summary of other action before diving into detail again. Focus on significant events. The trip to the library, the trip to Goodwill—these changed the writer, while mile marker 193 in Kansas did not.

Writing the Beginning

The beginning of your essay has a number of jobs:

• Catch the reader's attention
• Introduce the character (yourself)
• Describe the setting (time and place)
• Create conflict

You can click on the side notes of this excerpt to see how the sample student essay does all of these things in a compact space:

This excerpt catches the reader's attention by creating an intriguing mood. You can experiment with other opening strategies.

1. Start in the middle of the action.

   A lump in my throat, I grabbed a script and took the stage in front of a theater filled with strangers. Old strangers. How did I wind up here?

2. Use interesting dialogue.

   "If you get cast in this show, you're going to have to swear. Onstage. Loudly."

3. Pose a fascinating question.

   Do caterpillars know what they are doing when they entomb themselves in a chrysalis, or do they just figure they've finally gone crazy? I felt slightly crazy when I buried myself in two months of rehearsals for On Golden Pond.

4. Make a startling statement.

   Sometimes guts are smarter than brains.