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Tips For Chosing The Perfect Resume And Cover Letters

I am a social worker for a mid-size agency. I work with children with mental health issues. Our agency offers internships to social work students from the various universities in the area. Most of the other workers do not like supervising interns, however I feel that it is rewarding and helps me be a better social worker. I have noticed through the years that the resume and cover letters of the students are getting much more uniform due to computer programs. There are several programs that are available to help a person create a resume and cover letters; however it is important for people to remember that they should let some portion of their own personality come through when using these programs.

The universities have a job fair each semester for students to talk to different agencies about internships. I have represented our agency at this fair for several years. My role is to let the students know what our agency does and what would be expected of them as an intern. I then give them our contact information so they can send their resume and cover letters to us. I then contact other social workers to see if anyone wants to have an intern, and if so set up interviews between the intern candidate and the social worker. Due to our location we often have several candidates each semester.

A few years ago it was easy to weed through candidates by reading their resume and cover letters. Now that the university has a model for the students to follow I find that the resumes all look the same. Now it is like going through the answers to a questionnaire to find a good candidate. This task used to be fun, but now with the uniform responses it is quite dull. I find that I pick candidates for interviews that vary in some way in what they present in the resume and cover letters. The variation gives me a hint of the person’s creativity and also their ability to sell themselves. Being able to sell yourself to kids and families is a huge asset in our agency and being creative is a must. I have found that the grades of the students mean less than their ability to talk and better still listen to the needs of the families we work with. Taking the time to listen is key to discovering how best to work with a family. So many of us go through days without having someone stop and really listen to what we have to say. Having the experience of being listened to is validating to a person. This semester I picked the intern that included an example of good listening skills in their resume and cover letters.