Free Career and Job Search Advice

[sumaiyah]

Hi there!

I only have a high-school education and 1 year of Community College. Should I mention this college time on my CV or not even though I didn't receive a degree?

Thank you for your help.

PS: By the way this college time was spent studying Photography so it is not related to the job position I am currently applying for which is a teaching job, grade K at a Montesorri school.

[safri]

It doesn't matter this year is not related to the specific of the job you are searching for, you should list it because it is a part of your experience. Educational experience. Besides, any type of experience is useful, so don't even think about not placing this year in your resume. So what if you don't have a degree? You have the skills, right?
Another thing. Photography has a lot to do with passion for beautiful things so...there you go, very useful, don't you think? A teacher should be calm, should be patient. A photographer as well.

[ResumeWriter]

I agree with Safri on listing the college experience. You could reflect the details as such:

34 Credit Hours, XYZ Community College
City, State (Semester 3.6 GPA)

Although the degree/certificate program itself is unrelated to your career focus, did you take relevant classes? For example, Fundamentals of Public Speaking and Accounting classes can have some relevancy when applying for a position outside of photography.

[lilo]

If you didn't manage to get a degree out of the college experience, you should go to the college secretarial department and ask for a certificate which attests the disciplines you have done during this period. They will release a certificate which should look something like this:

Discipline - form of verification - credits - hours - grade.

This certificate will be useful to you not only to get a job (or to certify you have experience in a domain), but it will help you in the eventuality you might want to follow another type of education later on.

[sumaiyah]

Wow, great advice!

And ResumeWriter you are correct, I did take other classes such as Psychology, which I'm sure is relevant to teaching! Perhaps my college time is worth mentioning after all.

Thanks for reminding me that experience alone is still valued in a society that demands the ever so prized degree.

[Katja144]

And, you don't have to say you never graduated...you can always word it like "Have x number of hours toward x degree." That could imply that you're still working toward it....yet doesn't come out and say you are.

[C_Vaughan]

You should be proud of that 1 year of college education. There are a lot of people who don't have that. You're already ahead of some of your competition.

List it. I would also suggest you include the dates you attended as you're likely going to be asked this question anyway in an interview.

~C. Vaughan