Hi FCC! Please check out my resume and give any and all advice on how to improve it or my projects.
Mod Edit: Personal Information removed
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Hey @clguitar1 I like your style!
Maybe, âjustifyâ the text of the projects and provide titles as hyperlinks?
Also visually separate title from the description. I would also include link on Github or some CodePen projects.
For me, it was good approach to upload the FCC projects on React to GitHub Pages.
If you have some job experience, even if itâs irrelevant - try to include maybe? Itâs still your experience, just summarise it.
These are just my thoughts 
But I really like your style
@clguitar1, I will be a little critical here, though I hope to be useful.
The very first thing I noticed is the layout, which is also the only suggestion I have about.
Your âExperience Withâ section - could you make so that the two columns align with the two columns in the âProjectsâ section - they are to the left slightly which reduces the appeal of the otherwise awesome resumeâ.
Also, in your âEducationâ section - perhaps you could start each topic (Udemy etc.) from the start without the tab. In the Udemy, your skills continue in a single line which continues to the end - perhaps three columns, in this case, should be eye-catching.
I wouldnât say no to adding experience as well - summarized as per the advice, you already received.
- Until you have professional dev experience of some sort, Iâd recommend not calling yourself a âWeb Developerâ. The term âweb developerâ is incredibly generic anyway.
- Delete your full mailing address, and just leave your city & state.
- No LinkedIn profile is a red flag. Everyone should have one.
- Some of your skills should be properly capitalized, like âJavaScriptâ, âGitHubâ, and âWordPressâ. Also React is no longer formally known as âReactJSâ, itâs just âReactâ now.
- Your project descriptions should be re-worded as more high-level and general descriptions. Make them sound distinctive to an average person, and leave out the tech-speak, because resumes are way more often read by recruiters and HR staff, not other developers.
- Neither Udemy or freeCodeCamp are accredited educational institutions, and so are best left off your resume. A better place to list them might be on your LinkedIn profile. Theyâre especially irrelevant as education when your resume shows a college degree.
- Given the years shown on your resume, surely you must have some sort of work experience between 1999 and 2016. Iâd recommend adding that, whatever it is. Thatâs too huge of a gap to visibly leave unfilled, and could very well be cause for immediate rejection.
- Assuming your resume is a PDF, all links on it should be clickable.
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You really think thereâs no use in adding that youâve completed 1800h worth of course material relative to the field? Iâm not arguing here, Iâm new, but surely that shows discipline, will to work hard and possibly passions, too
I have never done a Developer resume, however, you should try to fill it up with projects/experience instead.
If you do add FreeCodeCamp, you should list certifications you have received, as not many people will know what freecodecamp is.
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Not sure where you got the 1800h of course material from, but coursework in general of any kind is a meaningless addition to resumes. Just taking one or more courses on something doesnât make one an expert, and it doesnât concretely demonstrate ability, which is what companies are looking for. Especially on Udemy, which is a very inconsistent-quality platform and has some shockingly bad courses. Both Udemy and freeCodeCamp can be valuable sites to learn from, not disputing that, but theyâre both unknown and unrecognized by the vast majority of people.
Furthermore, simply studying or gaining textbook knowledge isnât valuable in itself - showing an ability to code and having experience is vastly more valuable. Itâs like the difference between merely reading about something and actually putting in the work to pull it off. The reading might be useful, but is merely a mental exercise. When it comes to coding, you could do courses all day every day and certainly end up learning something, but that wonât develop skill in coding until you actually start writing code. This is why a lot of people say that if you want to learn to code, you have to write code. Also IMO, completing an online course hardly involves âworkâ. Theyâre often very easy to complete, especially since the vast majority of online courses on the Internet just involve passively watching a series of videos.
Completing a college degree, however, is a very widely-known metric, regardless of the area of study. College degrees are proof of a willingness to work hard and put oneself through a certain area of study for 4 years, and to also put in the money towards that effort. The average online course is nowhere near that level of commitment or near the level of academic rigor that a college class has.
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Thank you both for elaborating!
I understand where youâre coming from, and it makes absolute sense. I thought since Iâd be lacking industry experience it wouldnât hurt to throw it on there in the beginning, obviously with projects and a portfolio to back up my skills. I see now itâs not necessary.
Also, 1800h comes from their suggested hours per stage of (300hours) each
What would you say about resumeâs for people who donât have a college degree?
A little background to this, I do have some college education, missing a couple of classes for my associates in math and physics but I started that degree in 2017 then had to quit before finishing it a couple of years ago due to my family needing financial help again. I was about to go back to school this year but again, Iâm unable to with the current situation thanks to covid-19.
To summarize: Iâm a 33 year old who started college very late and couldnât even finish it due to finances (I donât live in the US nor am I a resident or citizen so financial aid was and is all but out of the question.)
Iâd prepare one with a simpler layout.
Basic line by line with bullet point and header and no dual-column text will work just fine. The reasoning is simple, it is the most machine-readable format with the least chance of creating non-sense text going through format transitions.
Your project descriptions donât follow a consistent format and theme. One app you only describe the function, others you have specific detail technologies use, almost none use active voice. Have a consistent format and style. Managers spend 30 secs tops screening these resumes, make it easy on them as much as possible.
Switch to an active voice, highlight and emphasize things you have done in the projects rather than the project itself. Youâre not selling your projects, youâre selling you. People donât care that your app generates random Yoga exercises. They want to know what you used, learned and accomplished. If you feel like youâre repeating the same things and have a lot of overlap, then you should consider diversifying your projects.
Neither freecodecamp nor udemy should be on your resume. At best they are irrelevant, at worst people can belittle your competency based on bias. List your real degree and move on.
Hi, should i just delete âWeb Developerâ?
Iâd say itâs fine to omit if you havenât completed a degree. But then you should probably focus on other things like experience or projects.
Iâd say you probably should. There was a time when it was fine to use, but nowadays with the proliferation of front-end, back-end, and full-stack designations, âweb developerâ has just sort of become obsolete and generic.