Jake's Resume for New Grads: How to Fill It When You Have No Experience
Section-by-section guidance for students and new graduates. What to put in Projects, how to frame coursework, and how to make one page feel full.
Thejus Sunny
Engineering + hiring perspective
You're a CS student or recent graduate. You've found Jake's Resume — the template everyone recommends. You open it up, see the example content (full-stack roles at real companies, impressive metrics), and think: I have none of this.
That's completely normal. Jake's Resume wasn't designed only for experienced engineers. The template works just as well for students — you just need to know what to put in each section. This guide walks you through it.
The Right Section Order for New Grads
The original Jake's Resume puts Education first, which is exactly right for students. Here's the section order you should follow:
- Education — your strongest credential as a student
- Projects — your proof that you can build things
- Experience — internships, TA roles, research, part-time work
- Technical Skills — honest inventory of what you know
If you have a strong internship (at a well-known company, or with substantial technical work), you can swap Experience and Projects. But for most new grads, Projects will be the stronger section.
Education: More Than Just Your GPA
As a student, your Education section does heavy lifting. Here's what to include and how to format it.
- University name and location
- Degree (B.S. in Computer Science, etc.)
- Expected graduation date or graduation date
- GPA if 3.0 or higher (leave it off if lower — the absence is neutral)
- Relevant coursework — but only if it fills a gap
When to Include Coursework
Include relevant coursework when you don't have enough projects or experience to fill the page. Choose courses that signal technical depth relevant to your target role:
- For SWE roles: Data Structures, Algorithms, Operating Systems, Databases, Distributed Systems
- For ML/AI roles: Machine Learning, Deep Learning, Linear Algebra, Probability & Statistics
- For systems roles: Computer Architecture, Networks, Compilers, Operating Systems
- For web/frontend: HCI, Web Development, Software Engineering, UI/UX Design
Once you have two or more technical experience entries, drop the coursework line. It's a filler that experienced candidates don't need.
Honors and Awards
If you have Dean's List, scholarships, or competition wins, add them as a single line under Education. Keep it brief — "Dean's List (Fall 2024, Spring 2025), ACM ICPC Regional Finalist" is enough. Don't create a separate Awards section unless you have 3+ notable achievements.
Projects: Your Most Important Section
For new grads without extensive work experience, Projects is where you prove you can build software. This section should be the strongest and most detailed part of your resume.
What Counts as a Project?
Almost anything you built with code qualifies:
- Class projects (especially capstone, senior design, or upper-level course projects)
- Hackathon projects (even incomplete ones, if the technical work was substantial)
- Personal side projects (apps, tools, games, websites)
- Open-source contributions (even small ones — bug fixes, documentation PRs)
- Research prototypes or tools built for a professor
- Freelance or volunteer technical work
Don't have "impressive" projects? That's fine.
You don't need a project with 1,000 GitHub stars. A well-explained CRUD app with authentication, a CLI tool that solves a real problem, or a data visualization dashboard all demonstrate real skills. What matters is how you describe what you built and why.
How to Write Project Bullets
Each project entry should have: project name, technologies used, dates, and 2-4 bullets. Here's how to write bullets that actually impress:
- Weak: "Built a to-do app using React"
- Strong: "Built a task management app with React and Firebase, featuring real-time sync across devices, drag-and-drop reordering, and Google OAuth — used daily by 3 roommates for shared grocery lists"
The strong version tells you what was built, what technologies were used, what features were implemented, and that it actually has users. Every detail adds credibility.
Follow this framework for each bullet:
- Lead with a strong action verb: Built, Designed, Implemented, Developed, Created, Integrated
- Name the specific technology or approach: "using WebSockets," "with a PostgreSQL backend," "via the Spotify API"
- Explain the technical challenge or decision: "to handle concurrent updates," "ensuring sub-200ms response times," "supporting offline mode"
- Add scale or outcome if possible: number of users, data points processed, performance metrics
How Many Projects Should You Include?
Include 2-3 projects. More than that, and each gets too little space for meaningful detail. It's better to have 2 well-described projects with 3-4 bullets each than 4 projects with 1-2 bullets each.
Experience: Everything Counts
You may think "I don't have experience" — but you probably do. Technical experience for new grads includes:
Internships
Even short internships (3 months) count. Write detailed bullets about what you built, not what the company does.
Teaching Assistant
TAing shows communication skills and deep subject knowledge. Mention specific improvements: "Redesigned lab exercises, increasing average assignment scores by 12%."
Research Assistant
Describe what you built or analyzed, not the professor's broader research topic. Focus on your technical contribution.
Freelance / Contract
Built a website for a local business? Created an automation script for a nonprofit? These count as real engineering work.
Open Source
Meaningful contributions to established projects show you can work with existing codebases — a skill many new grads lack.
Campus Organizations
Technical leadership in clubs (ACM, HackClub, robotics team) counts if you did actual technical work, not just attended meetings.
If you genuinely have zero technical experience beyond classwork, that's okay. Lean harder on your Projects section and consider picking up a small freelance project, contributing to open source, or building a personal project that solves a real problem for someone.
Technical Skills: Be Honest
The Skills section is the easiest to fill and the easiest to get wrong. Here are the rules:
- Only list technologies you can discuss in an interview. If someone asked "Tell me about your experience with Docker," could you give a real answer?
- Organize by category: Languages, Frameworks, Tools/Platforms, Databases
- Order within each category by proficiency or relevance to the role
- Don't list soft skills here — "teamwork" and "communication" don't belong in a technical skills section
- Include relevant coursework technologies: if you used MIPS in your architecture class, that counts as assembly experience
A good heuristic: if you haven't used a technology in the last 6 months and couldn't answer basic questions about it, remove it from your skills list.
Filling the Page: Practical Tips
One of the biggest anxieties for new grads is having a resume that looks too empty. Here are practical strategies:
- Add more detail to project bullets — most students under-describe their work
- Include class projects you're proud of, especially if they involved substantial engineering
- Add relevant coursework to your Education section
- Include a hackathon project, even if it's incomplete
- Mention specific contributions to group projects — don't let team size dilute your individual work
- Add any certifications or online courses that are directly relevant (AWS, GCP, Coursera ML specialization)
But do not pad your resume with fluff. A resume that's 80% full with strong content is better than a resume that's 100% full with filler. White space is not your enemy.
Common New Grad Mistakes
Listing every language from CS 101
If you wrote 50 lines of Haskell in a PL class, that doesn't belong on your resume. Only list languages you can actually use.
Putting GPA in bold or oversized font
A 3.8 GPA is good, but it doesn't need to be the biggest thing on your resume. Let it sit naturally in the Education section.
Describing what the company does, not what you did
"Interned at a fintech startup that processes $2B in transactions" tells the reader nothing about you. Focus on your contributions.
Using the same bullets for similar projects
If you have two React projects, make sure each highlights different skills — one might focus on state management, the other on API integration.
Forgetting to link GitHub/portfolio
Your projects section claims you built things. Your GitHub proves it. Always include the link.
Submitting without proofreading
Typos in a resume are an instant red flag. Read it out loud, have a friend check it, or use a tool that catches issues automatically.
Your Resume Is a Living Document
Don't try to create the perfect resume in one sitting. Build a strong first version, then update it every time you complete a project, finish an internship, or learn a significant new technology. The best resumes are maintained continuously, not rewritten from scratch before each application cycle.