THE

SUBTLE
ART OF
BUILDING Students’
Academic

A Cell

GO D CV
A COUNTERINTUITIVE APPROACH
TO LANDING A DREAM INTERNSHIP

SAKSHAM CONSUL
ADIL KHAN
Presenter’s ○ This presentation is purely
directed for CVs for research
Note based opportunities, be it
internships, thesis or Masters,
PhD applications.
○ This presentation is made from
our collective experience and
knowledge gained from multiple
seniors and friends. The
presenters have tried to include
every point but some details may
have been overlooked.
○ The presenters have tried to be as
precise as possible but human error
is possible. In no way are the
presenters liable to be held
responsible.
○ No matter how skilful one is in the
art of CV building, nothing covers
for the lack of points. All readers are
advised to obtain noteworthy life
experiences which can be used as
strong CV points.
WHAT IS A CV?
• Record of all your achievements
• Deal maker/breaker
• Your spokesperson
• The ultimate bait
Desire
○ High Impact
◦ Relevance to position
◦ Skill Set
◦ Organization capabilities
○ High Quality of
◦ Content
◦ Size and Arrangement
 “
Have just 6.25 seconds. The fish needs
to take the bait!
Preparation for the ‘dark’
arts
To do on a piece List all achievements: Write everything Rank according to
From school to productive done on importance and tailor
of paper: everything done in campus. Clubs, points for purpose of
BITS Pilani. department, teams, CV
workshops, online
courses, challenges.
Everything
• Common publishing tools: LaTex, Microsoft Word, Paper
• Highly recommend LaTex
• Many online templates available on www.overleaf.com

• LaTex is extensively used for publishing purposes. Highly recommended

to learn
CV Example
Whoa! Aren’t you excited?
 Header Research Experience Course Projects

Details
Education Details Publications/Symposiums Academic
Achievements

Technical Skills Mentorship Experience Key Courses Taken

PORs and Extra-

curriculars
Introduction:

Do’s Don’ts
Name Home address
Phone Number Photo
Email ID Social Networking Links
Webpage link Tinder
Github link
Education:

• Include academic information of current institute and one

lower. (i.e. BITS and 12th)
• Mention degree to be earned as well as duration and timeline
Mention CGPA

Bonus: Mention GRE or TOEFL if given.

 Research Experience:

• Most important section!

• Can club SOP, LOP, DOPs in this section to fleshen it up
• Mention guide’s name. Hyperlink it!
• Include project duration
• Project title on top. That’s catchy!
 Research Experience:

• Sub points are vital

• Gives information about project

• At max 3-4 points.

• Each subpoint should ideally take 1 complete line! Not half a line or two lines
• Use action words!

• Bold important figures. Use data and statistics!

Publications / Symposiums:

• Mention all authors! Bold your name.

• Include complete title and publication detail (Journal

name, Conference name)

• Status of paper.

• Bold is your friend!

• You can include submitted papers/papers under review.

 ADVICE: Upload papers under review/publication at
arXiv.org. Then link it in CV.

Helps build credibility of paper. Allows to share work without

fear of theft.

Note: Make sure publisher allows it!

Course Projects:
Academic Achievements:

• List your major achieve academic achievements in

reverser chronological order
• Cardinal Sin: Mentioning that national rakhi making
competition you won in 4th grade
Technical Skills:

• The purpose of this section is to demonstrate that you

have the necessary skills to perform the task you are
applying for
• It is a good idea to create 3 lists for this section:
Programming Languages
Relevant Software
Documentation Skills
Mentorship Experience:
Key Courses:

• For your core courses, mention only the ones that will
prove relevant for the applied internship
• It is a good idea to divide this section into 3 lists:
Core Branch Courses
Mathematics
Miscellaneous
• Instead of writing Maths I, II and III mention Applied
Calculus, Linear Algebra and Differential Equations
Hobbies / Extra-curriculars / PoRs:

• Be aware of the conclusions that might be drawn from

your entries here
• It is important to pay attention to how you mention what
you mention here
• Try to highlight how your club/departmental activities
have a research side to them
• Cardinal Sin: Mentioning watching anime/learning from
Quora
Eg. If you are in the Dance Club

Do not write:
‘As a member of the Dance Club, participated in
cultural festival of BITS Pilani.’

Write instead:
‘Organized and choreographed performances of the
Dance Club, an organization of __(no of members)__ dance
enthusiasts at BITS Pilani.’
Other Useful Tips
 ○ Use active voice ○ Explain points:
General ○ Show task What does Merit
completion scholarship mean?
○ No slangs! ○ Maximum length: 2
pages
○ Action words!
○ Recheck, recheck
○ Bullet points!
and did I mention,
recheck?
Research well enough to know what the
professor might be looking for
Some people are under the impression that building a CV is,
in fact, an essay writing competition. They end up writing
long paragraphs, mentioning every little detail, of every
single project they have ever done. As a consequence,
relevant details are often lost in these bulky paragraphs,
and a professor loses patience trying to find them.

• Use bullet points instead

• Bullet points are easy to read
• Bullet points are beautiful :)
Do not repeat yourself.
Do not repeat yourself.
Do not repeat yourself.
Do not repeat yourself.
Do not repeat yourself.
Do not repeat yourself.
Do not repeat yourself.
Do not repeat yourself.
Do not repeat yourself.
Do not repeat yourself.
make shure there are no spelling and
grammatical miskates.
Use action verbs wherever possible:
A perfect curriculum vitae is like an ideal
society. It can only be strived towards,
and never achieved.
~Adil Khan, 2019
(and not the person on the left)
Summarizing the subtle art:

for i=1:inf
disp(‘Do cool stuff’);
disp(‘Update CV’);
disp(‘Seek corrections’);
disp(‘Update CV’);
end
Thanks!
Need further help?
Contact us at
f2016221@pilani.bits-pilani.ac.in (Adil)
f2016424@pilani.bits-pilani.ac.in (Saksham)