[nabs-l] Dealing With Gaps In Resumes and Having Little to No Work Experience

[Elizabeth Mohnke]

Hello Misty,

I applaud you for being a successful single parent. I think this job 
requires a lot of hard work and patience. I would definitely encourage you 
to list the stills you have learned as a single parent on your resume.

I think there are two different ways you could go about doing this. First, 
you could list your role as a single parent on your resume in the form of 
being a childcare provider. You could then highlight some of your 
achievements in this area.

Alternatively, you could choose to use a functional resume instead of a 
chronological resume. When using this format, you list three or four key 
skill sets that are relevant for the job you are seeking, and then list 
specific examples of how you have demonstrated these skills through your 
work and volunteer experience. I have heard this type of resume works best 
for those who do not have much experience.

Since you have experience as a single parent, and you are looking to go into 
elementary teaching, perhaps you may wish to find a job as a childcare 
provider. I would think daycare centers as well as private childcare 
services would serve as potential employment opportunities. You could try 
looking in either your school newspaper or local newspaper for these kinds 
of employment opportunities. In addition, I think you could advertise that 
you are seeking this kind of position as well.

Also, you may wish to investigate what kinds of financial services your 
school offers to single parents. I know my school offers financial 
assistance to single parents in the form of helping out with tuition and 
childcare. Therefore, you may wish to see if your school offers a similar 
kind of program.

I hope some of these ideas help you when creating your resume and seeking 
employment opportunities.

Best of luck,
Elizabeth




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From: "Misty Dawn Bradley" <mistydbradley at gmail.com>
Sent: Tuesday, September 24, 2013 11:04 AM
To: "Jobs for the Blind" <jobs at nfbnet.org>; "NABS List" <nabs-l at nfbnet.org>
Subject: [nabs-l] Dealing With Gaps In Resumes and Having Little to No 
WorkExperience

> Hi all,
> I am wondering how people deal with having gaps in their resumes? I have 
> heard that many employers judge by whether the applicant has had a steady 
> work history. Due to the fact that I had to stay home with my daughter as 
> a single mother, I have a gap of about 4 or 5 years in my resume, although 
> I have some volunteer work that I did toward the end of it with AmeriCorps 
> which I did put on my resume. I am also now in school and have been since 
> 2012 working toward my associates in elementary education in order to 
> transfer to a university to complete my bachelor degree in education. I am 
> trying to apply for jobs to make ends meet while in school, and I am 
> trying to figure out how to deal with and account for the gaps in my 
> resume since graduating from high school in 2006.
> I am also running into the problem that most of the jobs advertised for 
> and geared toward college students are highly visual jobs that require you 
> to either drive or do a lot of visual things, such as dealing with 
> inventory, organizing it by product number and size/color, and inputting 
> data on shipments, etc. Otherwise, all other jobs require a lot of 
> experience that I don’t have. How did you list members get around all of 
> this, and what types of work did you do to make a living and support 
> yourself while attending college? How did you obtain jobs if you had 
> little or no experience in low-level jobs such as customer service, office 
> administration, retail, and other jobs of this nature? My classes are all 
> online, so potentially, I could do part-time or full-time work. I have 
> heard of people doing volunteer work to get experience, which I have done 
> in the fields of education/tutoring with AmeriCorps, but right now I need 
> a job to pay rent, bills, food, and other monthly expenses, so, although 
> volunteer work is good, I need something that I can live on as well as 
> support my daughter.
> Any ideas or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
> Thank you in advance,
> Misty
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