- Use a personal email address on the ERAS
application
- Use a U.S. Address
- Use a U.S. Phone Number
- Your application photo matters.
Provide a good one!
Description of experiences
- Spell, Capitalize and Punctuate Correctly
- Use gapping and parallelism.
- Gapping is the use of incomplete sentences to present your information concisely.For example, you might write: Composition Instructor (2000–2004). Planned course activities. Graded all assignments.”By using incomplete sentences, you cut out unnecessary words but convey the responsibilities of the position.
- Parallelism means keeping the structure of your phrases consistent throughout a document.For example, if you use verb phrases in one portion of your CV to describe duties, use them throughout your CV. Verb phrases are a strong way to describe responsibilities. Use the present tense for roles you currently hold and past tense for former roles.
- An example of parallelism could be:
- Taught a class of 20 students
- Graded all assignments.
- Planned course activities
- You should use both gapping and parallelism when writing a successful CV.
Reader should understand the extent of your experience in terms of:
Settings
- Whom you worked with (types of specialists, researchers, etc. you worked with)
- Populations served (adults, children, underserved, bilingual)
- Clinical issues you addressed
- Skills developed/demonstrated during the experience
- Achievements/Accomplishments gained during the experience
- Extracurricular activities and interests. Briefly focus on how activities helped you develop skills.
- OK to use bullets
- Use action-oriented verbs
- Don’t use the first person.
I distributed medications at . . .” vs. “Distributed medications at . . .”