Text A – Group 1: What is a CV?



A CV (Cur­ri­cu­lum Vitae) is a short do­cu­ment that shows your edu­ca­ti­on, work ex­pe­ri­ence, skills and achie­vements. It gives an em­p­loy­er a clear and quick over­view of who you are and what you can do. A CV should be easy to read, well-​structured and pro­fes­si­o­nal – usu­al­ly no lon­ger than one page.



The first part of a CV con­tains your per­so­nal de­tails: your full name, ad­dress, phone num­ber and email. Make sure your email ad­dress looks for­mal and not funny or chil­dish. Some people also add their date of birth or na­ti­o­na­li­ty, but this is often op­ti­o­nal.



After your per­so­nal de­tails, you can write a short per­so­nal state­ment. This is two or three sen­ten­ces about your cha­rac­ter, strengths and goals. It ex­plains what kind of job you are loo­king for and what type of per­son you are.



Ex­amp­le: I am a mo­ti­va­ted and re­li­a­ble stu­dent who en­joys working in a team and lear­ning new skills.



Next, list your edu­ca­ti­on and trai­ning. Start with the most re­cent school or cour­se and then go back­wards. In­clu­de school names, years and qua­li­fi­ca­ti­ons. After that, write about your work ex­pe­ri­ence – for ex­amp­le, in­tern­ships, part-​time jobs, or vol­un­teer work. Al­ways in­clu­de the job title, the com­pa­ny name, and the time pe­ri­od. Under each job, add two or three bul­let points de­scri­bing your main tasks or re­spon­si­bi­li­ties. Use ac­tion verbs such as or­ga­ni­zed, sup­por­ted, crea­ted, hel­ped, ma­na­ged, or as­sis­ted.



In the next sec­tion, de­scri­be your skills and achie­vements. This can in­clu­de IT know­ledge, lan­gu­ages, team­work, problem-​solving or cer­ti­fi­ca­tes. You can also men­ti­on hob­bies and in­te­rests – but only if they show po­si­ti­ve qua­li­ties like team­work, crea­ti­vi­ty or re­spon­si­bi­li­ty. For ex­amp­le: Play­ing foot­ball in a club shows team spi­rit.



At the end, write re­fe­ren­ces – people who can re­com­mend you – or sim­ply write “Re­fe­ren­ces availa­ble on re­quest.”

A CV should al­ways look pro­fes­si­o­nal: use one clear font, con­sis­tent lay­out, and no spel­ling mista­kes. Avoid using co­lours, emo­jis or ca­su­al lan­guage. A good CV is fac­tu­al and for­mal, not emo­ti­o­nal. It shows your ex­pe­ri­ence and abi­li­ties, not your per­so­na­li­ty or fee­lings.