There are several reasons you might have taken a break from your teaching career. Perhaps you stopped to raise your own children, maybe you had to care for a loved one or perhaps it just took you a little longer than planned to find the perfect educational role.
But whether your career gap was three months or three years, you might be concerned about how you’re going to tackle this when it comes to writing your CV.
Just remember, a career break is nothing to be ashamed of, and there are some simple ways you can explain an employment gap on your application and put a positive spin on it.
Always be honest
First and foremost, you should always be as honest as possible about the reasons behind your employment gaps. Even if you’re worried about the length of time you were out of work, you should never lie on your CV.
Otherwise, you run the risk of getting caught out, which looks unprofessional and could cost you the job.
Make use of your personal profile
On any CV template, your personal profile is found in the top quarter of your CV and is your chance to introduce yourself to the recruiter. Although you shouldn’t dedicate much time to the employment gap in your profile, if you’re still unemployed, you might wish to dedicate a sentence to this in your personal profile.
An example of this might be ‘dedicated biology teacher with 10 years experience teaching in secondary schools, looking for an exciting new teaching post after taking a year out to recover from illness.’
Include this in your employment history
If you don’t have a huge amount of experience or you’re worried about addressing your gap directly in your personal profile, you can use your experience section instead.
Where you would usually list your employment history, you should give the reason and dates of your employment gap. It might look something like this:
Feb 2018 - Feb 2022 - Childcare
I took a couple of years out of work to have my two children and to spend some time with them before they started school themselves.
Put a positive spin on it
No matter what your reasons for having a career break are, you should own the narrative and always put a positive spin on things. For example, if it took you longer than planned to get hired, explain that you were holding out for the perfect role that would advance your career and help you reach your goals.
Or, if you decided to go travelling, be sure to include the transferable skills you learned from the experience. For a teaching role, some of the top skills you might include could be confidence, communication, organisation, language skills or learning about other cultures.
So be creative with your language and show how your break from the education industry has helped you to grow both personally and professionally.
Go into more detail on your cover letter
If you’ve briefly outlined an employment gap on your CV, the recruiter might still be curious about what you were doing with your time. So, if you plan to attach a cover letter with your application, this presents you with an opportunity to go into more detail about what happened and how this has shaped you and your career.
Don’t worry about it
Try not to get too bogged down in your employment gap. There doesn’t always have to be a reason for prolonged gaps, and where you have a reason, simply explain this as best you can on your CV and cover letter.
It is perfectly acceptable to take a break from your career, and recruiters will have seen this hundreds of times before. So don’t let it stress you out or impact the rest of your job search; just work on crafting an impressive application that showcases your skills, experience and achievements.
Be proactive
Finally, it’s important that you are always being proactive in your career. So, if you’re currently unemployed for whatever reason and you’re worried that the gap is only getting bigger, don’t just sit around waiting.
Be sure to keep expanding your knowledge and skills and gaining experience wherever possible. This might mean taking an online course while you’re job hunting, or volunteering your time at the local school, community centre or extracurricular club.
By staying proactive, you not only give yourself more to talk about on your CV, but you prove to the recruiter you are still dedicated and passionate about your career and that you’re taking positive steps to grow professionally.
About the author
Andrew Fennell
Andrew Fennell is the founder and director of StandOut CV, a leading UK careers advice website. He is a former recruitment consultant and contributes careers advice to publications like Business Insider, The Guardian, and The Independent.
