Resume for Teens: Examples & Template (2026)

Writing your first resume feels like being asked to summarise a book you haven't read yet. You stare at the blank page thinking, "I haven't done anything worth putting on here."

That feeling is completely normal, and completely wrong.

Whether you're 15 and looking for a weekend job, or 18 and applying for your first proper role, you almost certainly have more to offer than you realise. Babysitting counts. Volunteering counts. Running the school football team's social media counts. That time you organised a fundraiser for your local charity? That absolutely counts.

The trick isn't having impressive experience. It's knowing how to present the experience you already have. Employers hiring teenagers aren't expecting a polished professional track record. They're looking for someone who seems reliable, enthusiastic, and willing to learn. That's a much lower bar than most teens imagine.

By the end of this guide, you'll have a complete resume ready to send out. Let's build it together.

What Employers Actually Expect from Teen Applicants

Here's something that might surprise you: when a manager at a cafe, retail shop, or swimming pool reads a teenager's resume, they're not looking for work experience. Most teen applicants don't have any, and hiring managers know that.

What they're actually looking for is evidence that you'll show up on time, be pleasant to work with, and follow instructions without needing constant supervision.

Specifically, employers hiring teens care about:

• Reliability: Can you commit to a schedule? Have you shown up consistently for anything (school, a sports team, volunteering)?
• Communication skills: Can you speak to customers politely? Can you write a coherent email?
• Enthusiasm: Do you actually want this job, or are your parents making you apply?
• Availability: When can you work? This is often the most important factor for part-time teen roles.
• Basic responsibility: Have you been trusted with anything before? Looking after children, handling money at a school event, managing equipment?

A study by the National Association of Colleges and Employers found that problem-solving, teamwork, and communication are consistently the top attributes employers look for in young candidates. None of those require a formal job to develop.

So if you've ever been on a sports team, helped organise a school event, volunteered at a food bank, or tutored a younger student, you've already demonstrated exactly what employers want to see. For details on formatting your GCSEs, A-levels, or high school education, see our guide on how to list education on a resume.

Full Teen Resume Example

Before we break down each section, here's what a complete teen resume looks like. This is for a 16-year-old applying for a part-time retail position:

EMMA RICHARDSON
Sheffield, UK | emma.richardson@gmail.com | 07700 123456

EDUCATION
Meadowbank Academy, Sheffield
GCSEs (Expected June 2026)
- Predicted grades: 7s and 8s across core subjects
- Relevant coursework: Business Studies, ICT, English Language

SKILLS
- Customer service: Regularly served customers at school charity events and bake sales
- Cash handling: Managed float and takings at school fundraising events (3 events, collected over GBP 400 total)
- Communication: Confident speaking with adults and young people in tutoring and volunteering roles
- Digital literacy: Proficient in Microsoft Office, Google Workspace, and Canva
- First Aid: St John Ambulance Youth First Aider certificate (2025)
- Languages: Conversational French (GCSE level)

VOLUNTEER WORK & EXTRACURRICULARS
Volunteer, Sheffield City Farm | September 2024 - Present
- Assist with weekend visitor sessions, greeting families and answering questions about the animals
- Help maintain enclosures and prepare animal feed for 15+ farm animals
- Recognised by the farm coordinator for consistent attendance over 18 months

Peer Tutor, Meadowbank Academy | January 2025 - Present
- Tutor Year 9 students in Maths during weekly lunchtime sessions
- Prepare simple revision worksheets and practice problems
- Helped 4 students improve by at least one grade over the autumn term

Captain, School Netball Team | September 2025 - Present
- Lead warm-ups, coordinate match-day logistics, and communicate with opposing teams
- Organised a charity netball tournament that raised GBP 250 for the local food bank

AWARDS & ACHIEVEMENTS
- Duke of Edinburgh Bronze Award (2025)
- Meadowbank Academy Student of the Term, Spring 2025
- School Maths Challenge regional finalist (2024)

REFERENCES
Available on request

This resume has zero paid work experience, and it's still strong. Every line demonstrates a quality that a hiring manager cares about: reliability, initiative, communication, and responsibility.

Resume Sections for Teens: A Complete Breakdown

Contact Information

Keep this simple and professional. Include:

• Full name (larger font, top of the page)
• City/town (no full address needed)
• Email address (a professional one, not sk8erboi2009@hotmail.com)
• Phone number (your mobile, so employers can actually reach you)

Leave off:

• Your full home address (city is enough)
• Your date of birth or age (not required and can invite bias)
• Social media handles (unless they're directly relevant, like a portfolio link)
• A photo (not standard in the UK, US, or Canada)

Email tip: If your current email address is embarrassing, create a new one. FirstnameLastname@gmail.com is always a safe choice. It takes two minutes and makes a genuine difference to how your application is perceived.

Education

For most teens, education is the strongest section on your resume. It shows employers that you're actively learning, can meet deadlines, and have structure in your life.

Include:

• School name and location
• Qualification you're working towards (GCSEs, A-levels, High School Diploma, IB)
• Expected completion date
• Predicted grades (if they're strong, meaning mostly Bs/6s and above)
• Relevant coursework (especially if it connects to the job)

If you're applying for a retail job and you're studying Business Studies, mention it. If you're applying for a tutoring role and you're predicted an 8 in Maths, that's worth highlighting.

What if your grades aren't great? Simply leave them off. Focus on coursework, subjects you enjoy, and any school-based achievements instead. No one expects a teenager to have a perfect academic record, and plenty of other things on your resume can demonstrate your value.

Skills

This section is where teens often sell themselves short. You have more skills than you think. The key is being specific rather than vague.

Weak skills section:

• Good communicator
• Hard worker
• Team player

Strong skills section:

• Customer service: Helped run the till at three school charity events, serving 50+ customers per session
• Digital literacy: Proficient in Google Docs, Sheets, Canva, and basic video editing (CapCut)
• Organisation: Coordinated schedules for a 12-person netball squad across the autumn season
• First Aid: Completed St John Ambulance Youth First Aider certification

See the difference? The second version gives evidence. It tells the employer what you can actually do, not just what adjectives you'd use to describe yourself.

Skills that teens commonly overlook:

For a deeper look at identifying and presenting your skills effectively, check out our resume skills guide.

Volunteer Work and Extracurriculars

This is the section that replaces "Work Experience" for most teens, and it can be just as impressive if you write it properly.

The trick is to format your volunteer work and activities exactly like you would format a job. That means:

• Role title and organisation name
• Dates (month and year)
• Bullet points describing what you did, using action verbs

Bad example:

Volunteered at local charity shop

Good example:

Volunteer Sales Assistant, Oxfam Sheffield | March 2025 - Present

• Sort and price donated clothing and homewares, processing approximately 30 items per shift
• Assist customers with purchases and operate the till during busy Saturday sessions
• Helped reorganise the book section, increasing visibility and contributing to a 15% sales uplift that month

The second version reads like a genuine job description. That's exactly the point. Hiring managers scan resumes quickly, and if your volunteer work is formatted like experience, it registers as experience.

Extracurriculars work the same way. Being on the debate team isn't just a hobby. It's evidence of research skills, public speaking, and the ability to think on your feet. Being in the school orchestra shows discipline, time management, and the ability to work as part of a group.

Write every activity with the question in mind: "What did I actually do, and what does it prove about me?"

Awards and Achievements

Keep this section short and factual. List any awards, certificates, or recognitions that demonstrate effort or talent:

• Duke of Edinburgh Awards (Bronze, Silver, Gold)
• Academic awards (Student of the Year, subject prizes)
• Competition results (Maths Challenge, science fairs, spelling bees, sports tournaments)
• Certificates (First Aid, food hygiene, safeguarding, coding courses)
• Scouting or Guiding achievements
• Music grades (ABRSM, Trinity, etc.)

If you don't have many awards, that's fine. This section is optional. A resume without an awards section is completely normal and won't count against you.

For more on how hobbies and interests can strengthen your resume, see our guide on resume hobbies and interests.

What Counts as Experience? More Than You Think

One of the biggest barriers for teens is believing they have nothing to put on a resume. The table below shows common teen activities and how to reframe them as resume-worthy experience:

Notice the pattern? Every entry uses a clear title, describes specific tasks, and includes numbers or details where possible. You're not lying or exaggerating. You're simply describing what you did in professional language.

If you want more strategies for building a resume without traditional employment, our guide on how to write a resume with no experience covers this in even more depth.

Teen Resume by Job Type

Different jobs care about different things. Here's how to tailor your resume depending on what you're applying for.

Retail and Fast Food

These are the most common first jobs for teens. Managers at shops and restaurants are primarily looking for:

• Availability: State your available hours clearly, either in a cover letter or a brief line on your resume
• Customer service skills: Any experience dealing with the public, even at school events
• Cash handling: Have you ever worked a till, collected money at a fundraiser, or sold anything?
• Reliability: Consistent attendance at school, clubs, or volunteering shows you'll turn up for shifts

Sections to emphasise: Skills (customer service, cash handling), Volunteer work (anything customer-facing), Education (Business Studies or similar)

Example bullet point:

Managed the refreshments stall at the school summer fair, serving 100+ customers over 4 hours and handling a cash float of GBP 50

Lifeguard and Summer Camp

These roles require specific qualifications but also value maturity and responsibility. Highlight:

• Certifications: Lifeguard qualifications (NPLQ, RLSS), First Aid, any water safety training
• Responsibility: Experience looking after younger children or being in a supervisory role
• Physical fitness: Sports team participation, swimming achievements, Duke of Edinburgh expeditions
• Teamwork: Any group activity where you had to coordinate with others

Sections to emphasise: Awards and Achievements (certifications), Extracurriculars (sports, DofE), Skills (First Aid, child supervision)

Example bullet point:

Completed the RLSS National Pool Lifeguard Qualification (2025) and maintained weekly training sessions to stay assessment-ready

Tutoring and Academic Roles

If you're applying to tutor younger students or work in a library or learning centre, your academic credentials matter most:

• Strong grades: Predicted grades in relevant subjects
• Teaching experience: Peer tutoring, mentoring younger students, explaining concepts to classmates
• Patience and communication: Any role where you've helped someone learn something
• Organisation: Preparing materials, managing a schedule, tracking progress

Sections to emphasise: Education (grades, relevant subjects), Volunteer work (tutoring, mentoring), Skills (communication, organisation)

Example bullet point:

Tutored 3 Year 10 students in GCSE English, meeting weekly to review essays and practise exam technique, with all students achieving their target grades

Office and Admin Internships

These are less common for younger teens but increasingly available for 17-18 year olds. Employers want to see:

• Digital skills: Microsoft Office, Google Workspace, email etiquette, basic spreadsheet ability
• Written communication: Clear writing, proper grammar, professional tone
• Organisation: Managing files, scheduling, keeping things tidy
• Initiative: Any example of you solving a problem or improving something without being asked

Sections to emphasise: Skills (digital literacy, organisation), Education (ICT, Business Studies), any experience with admin tasks

Example bullet point:

Created a shared Google Sheet to track netball team fixtures, results, and player availability, replacing a group chat system that frequently caused missed matches

Formatting Tips for Teen Resumes

Your resume's content matters most, but formatting determines whether anyone actually reads it. Follow these rules:

Keep it to one page. Always. No exceptions for teen resumes. If you're struggling to fill one page, that's fine. Half a page of strong content beats a full page of waffle.

Use a clean, simple layout. No fancy graphics, coloured backgrounds, or unusual fonts. Stick to:

• A standard font (Arial, Calibri, Helvetica, or Georgia) at 10-12pt
• Clear section headings in bold
• Consistent formatting throughout
• Reasonable margins (2-2.5cm on each side)

Use reverse chronological order. Your most recent activities go first within each section.

Save it as a PDF. Word documents can look different on different computers. PDFs look the same everywhere. Name the file sensibly: Emma-Richardson-Resume.pdf, not resume final FINAL v3 (2).docx.

Use bullet points, not paragraphs. Hiring managers spend 6-7 seconds on an initial resume scan. Bullet points are easier to skim than blocks of text.

Be consistent with formatting. If one job title is bold, they all need to be bold. If one date is right-aligned, they all need to be right-aligned. Inconsistency looks sloppy.

If you want to skip the formatting headaches entirely, JobSprout has free resume templates that handle the layout for you. You just fill in the content, and the template takes care of spacing, fonts, and structure automatically.

For a more detailed walkthrough of resume structure and formatting, check out our complete guide on how to write a resume.

Common Mistakes Teens Make on Their First Resume

Learning from other people's mistakes is much more efficient than making your own. Here are the most frequent issues we see on teen resumes:

1. Using an unprofessional email address

gamergirl2009@yahoo.com tells the employer nothing good about you. Create a simple firstname.lastname@gmail.com address. It's free and takes less than five minutes.

2. Writing "I" statements everywhere

Your resume isn't an essay. Instead of "I was responsible for organising the school fair," write "Organised the school summer fair, coordinating 8 stalls and 20 volunteers."

Start bullet points with action verbs: managed, created, organised, assisted, led, coordinated, prepared, delivered, maintained, supported.

3. Being too vague

"Helped out at events" means nothing. "Helped set up seating, managed the registration desk, and directed 150 attendees at the school awards evening" means a lot.

Every bullet point should answer: What did you do? How much? What was the result?

4. Including irrelevant personal information

Your resume does not need:

• Your age or date of birth
• Your home address (city is sufficient)
• Your parents' names or occupations
• Your National Insurance number
• A photo (unless specifically requested, which is rare)
• Your horoscope sign (yes, we've seen this)

5. Lying or exaggerating

It's tempting when you feel like you don't have enough experience. Don't do it. Employers who hire teens are experienced at interviewing young people. They can spot exaggeration quickly, and getting caught destroys your credibility instantly.

Instead, be honest and specific about what you've actually done. A genuine description of real babysitting experience is always more impressive than a vague claim about "extensive childcare management."

6. Making it longer than one page

If a CEO can fit their resume on two pages, a teenager can certainly fit theirs on one. Cut anything that doesn't directly support your application. Quality beats quantity every time.

7. Not proofreading

Spelling mistakes and grammatical errors are the easiest way to get your resume rejected before anyone reads the content. Read it out loud. Ask a parent, teacher, or older sibling to check it. Run it through a spell checker. Then check it one more time.

8. Using the same resume for every application

A resume for a retail job should emphasise different things than a resume for a tutoring position. You don't need to rewrite the entire document each time, but adjusting your skills section and reordering your bullet points to match each role makes a real difference.

JobSprout can help with this by letting you tailor your resume to specific job descriptions, highlighting the most relevant parts of your experience for each application.

Closing Thoughts

Everyone's first resume is a starting point. It won't be the best resume you ever write, and that's completely fine. The point isn't perfection. The point is showing an employer that you're someone worth giving a chance to.

You have more to offer than you think. The school projects, the volunteering, the babysitting, the sports teams, the weekend dog walking... all of it counts. All of it shows character, commitment, and capability.

Write it down. Format it neatly. Proofread it carefully. Send it off. And remember that every working adult, from the CEO of a Fortune 500 company to your local shop manager, once wrote their first resume too. They started somewhere, and now it's your turn.

Good luck. You've got this.