Whether you’re applying for your first teaching assistant job or you’re an experienced TA looking for a new challenge, you’re going to need a teaching assistant CV that sets you apart from the competition.
Here’s how to write a CV that gets you noticed by employers:
Pick the right CV format
Picking the right CV format is crucial because it ensures your CV shows off your best qualities as an educator. Your professional background and how much teaching-related work experience you have determines which type of format you should use when writing your CV.
The most popular option, the chronological CV, is the best choice for most applicants.
A chronological CV emphasises your professional experience and lists your previous roles from most recent to least recent. This gives employers a good overview of your work history, and they can quickly determine whether your experience and skills match the requirements of the job.
For some applicants, a skills based CV is the better option because it focuses on a candidate’s abilities rather than their employment history. Choose a skills based CV if you’re:
- Writing a teaching assistant CV with no experience
- Re-entering the workforce after a long period of unemployment
Start off with a strong teaching assistant personal statement
Having a convincing personal statement on your CV can greatly improve your chances of landing a teaching assistant job, because it helps immediately catch the attention of employers.
The employers reading your CV likely receive dozens of applications from competent TAs, so you need to stand out among the rest.
Follow these steps to write a persuasive personal statement:
- Mention how many years of teaching assistant experience you’ve had
- Highlight particularly relevant hard skills, soft skills, and accomplishments
- Explain how you plan on using your skill set to benefit the school and its pupils
- Limit your personal statement to 3-4 sentences
Here’s a good teaching assistant personal statement example:
This candidate effectively communicates to employers what their strengths as an educator are, as well as what they hope to achieve if they’re hired.
Focus on your achievements, not your responsibilities
A mistake many job applicants make is to turn their work experience section into a list of previous job duties. While phrases like “responsible for” and “tasked with” are accurate, they don’t provide a clear view of what you actually achieved as an educator.
To differentiate yourself from other candidates, you should instead give employers an idea of what you can do for them by listing your previous accomplishments in the workplace.
Compare these two statements:
The second example is more effective, because it shows what the candidate achieved by offering extra support to students who needed it.
To further strengthen your teacher assistant CV, quantify your accomplishments by including hard numbers whenever possible.
Here’s a good example of how to add numbers to your experience section:
Not only does this lend credibility to the candidate’s statement, it also demonstrates that they keep track of their students’ academic growth.
How to write a teaching assistant CV with no experience
As an applicant for a teaching assistant position, your CV should highlight experience and skills that demonstrate why you’d be a great educator. This doesn’t necessarily have to be experience gained in a classroom.
If you’ve worked as a tutor before, you can highlight your ability to create engaging lesson plans and mark homework. If you’re a former waitress, focus on your multitasking and stress management skills on your CV.
Even if you don’t have any work experience, you can still write a compelling experience section.
If you’re applying for your first job, focus on volunteer work and internships. Demonstrate what relevant skills you’ve picked up during these activities that make you a good candidate for a TA job.
