Whether you plan on staying in your current position, or are considering looking for something new, it’s important to keep your resume up to date. One way to show that you are advancing in your skills is to take continuing education courses, which can (and should!) be listed on your resume. Prospective and current employers both like to see recent educational efforts, which can qualify you for a promotion with your current company or for an entirely new career, if that’s your goal.
Choosing Which Courses to Take
Standalone courses often work well for learning new skills that dovetail with your current position and industry. If you are a school administrator with an advanced degree, for instance, you may want to take a course about a new student leadership program or a unique way of organizing teams for better learning. These courses will show that you are staying up on the latest trends and findings about school administration, which can help if you want to transfer to another school within your district, move up to district level administration, or change districts entirely.
Other continuing education courses focus on earning certifications and credentials that demonstrate learned skills. While these courses can bolster your resume even if you stay in the same job and career field, they are particularly helpful for those who may want to be promoted to a higher level job in their field or even change careers. It may even be possible to change to a completely different field, such as computer science, by obtaining pertinent certifications rather than having to go back to school and get another whole degree, which can take years.
Adding continuing education courses to your resume is easy to do.
How to List Continuing Education on Your Resume
So once you take some continuing education courses, how do you add them to your resume? Most simply, you can add these courses on to the “Education” section of your resume underneath your degree. If you want, you can change the title from just “Education” to “Education and Professional Development,” but you don’t need to unless it’s your preference.
You should be careful about which continuing education courses you list on your resume. Conventional wisdom says that if the courses are recent, within the last five years, you should give the dates. Older courses could still show important skills, but you can omit the dates for them.
All the courses you list should be relevant to the job for which you are applying, or for your current job if you are submitting an updated resume. Listing continuing education courses that don’t contribute to your skills for a current job or prospective opportunity will detract from your resume rather than enhance it.
CCSU offers continuing education courses that can enhance your resume in a dozens, maybe hundreds of different jobs and career fields, including certifications in a number of fields. View all our open courses to see what options might fit your schedule and requirements.