Residential Counselor Resume Examples

Residential counselors, or residence counselors, provide counseling services to help resident students deal with and overcome a variety of issues, such as performance anxiety, high stress, relationship problems, poor academic performance, low self-esteem, family issues, substance abuse and others. They assess residents’ health, social and behavioral needs, and conduct programs and sessions to provide support and guidance.

The primary objective of a residence counselor is to help students feel happy, confident and connected to their campus community. While the majority of residential counselor roles don’t require a degree, these counseling roles often do. In both cases, the amount of these future job openings is only expected to grow.

As it’s usually a resume’s topmost section, the professional summary is the first part most recruiters read. Here, succinctly describe the highlights of your qualifications that make you the best candidate for the role. Learn from our examples, or use our Resume Builder’s pre-written suggestions for guided help.

Here are three example summaries our builder might recommend:

1. Resident counselor with over nine years of experience in public universities. Certified counselor with expertise in substance abuse. Strong team player with a reputation of supporting residence staff with engaging activities to enhance student social skills. Possess strong ethics and communication skills with a superb sense of time management.
2. Engaging residential counselor with over five years of experience. Expertise in behavioral psychology and root-cause analysis. Conduct regular resident interactions and focus on implementing group and one-to-one sessions on specific subjects concerning the residents. Comfortable working for long hours and experienced maintaining on-call availability for over 40 residents at a time.
3. Dedicated residential counselor with over six years of experience. Adept at conflict-resolution and handling emergencies. Skilled in organizing training programs that encourage healthy habits and positive thinking among residents. Maintain affable attitude with residents and ensure strict adherence to college code and guidelines. Possess proficiency in documentation management and planning therapy schedules to match student schedules.

A well-written work experience section should simultaneously display your career trajectory and measurable work achievements to recruiters. Draft this section by using pre-written content from our Resume Builder that can be personalized with your metrics, or used as-is.

Here are three more work experience examples for your reference:

1. Coordinated with 12 RAs to plan and successfully implement development programs focused on time management and mental health.
2. Conduct biweekly video chat sessions with parents of 43 first-year residents over two semesters.
3. Spearheaded implementation of anonymously administered substance abuse counseling sessions; resulted in minimum 20% reduction in incidents or complaints related to student safety.