Recently I helped evaluating CVs that undergraduates sent asking for summer internships. Professors (and also postdocs, PhD students) are busy and make a quick decision based solely on your CV, so it is very important to write it well and make it stand out. Here are three guidelines that I summarized based on the common problems I have seen:

  1. Do not misspell

    It is quite disappointing to see that the name of a professor is misspelled. To me it kind of indicates that you are not so serious about the opportunity.

  2. Indicate the advisor of your research projects

    The descriptions in CVs are usually short and vague, and it’s hard to assess whether it is concrete or inflated. Indicating the advisor would help make a better estimation.

  3. Know what the professor is looking for

    In my research direction, which is machine learning and computer vision, keywords that may stand out are coding skills, maths, (related) research experiences, and publications are always desirable. Be sure to highlight those (preferably with bold).