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Comment by bdesimone | Hacker News Reader

Unless you are published, a page is enough. Seriously.

I was taught in school and recommended by parents to include everything from middle school education to current employment. Combine that with all skills, programming languages and projects I've worked on, and I actually have a hard time fitting it all on 2 pages.

Care to elaborate why you think "one page ought to be enough for everyone"? Seriously.

Middle school education? What country did you hear this in? That is definitely not the case in the US, and I'd venture to guess that would be customary only in countries where a middle school education is generally the highest level obtained.

Not sure middle school was the correct wording, but it's after primary school anyway. Ages 12-19. In middle school we basically have three primary types of education, depending on how smart you are (or how well you did in the tests anyway). At least for me as a student it's still relevant to mention it, even though I've done plenty of internships and projects to prove things. Maybe after a few jobs it should be left out, I don't know.

Edit: country is the Netherlands.

> I'd venture to guess that would be customary only in countries where a middle school education is generally the highest level obtained.

As you said yourself, cultures differ I guess :)

Edit 2: Looked it up, a better word may be secondary education. Info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secondary_education#Netherlands

That is different, although I've seen some in the US include high school (even when they went on to graduate college) if the writer felt the school had some prestige. That would equate to 14-18 years old in the US.

Thanks for the details, good to know about different cultures in case I run into any candidates from the Netherlands.

What's considered a good resume in the US definitely isn't in the Netherlands.

In the Netherlands two to three pages is the sweet spot and a one pager would be considered odd. If you're just out of University two pages should be possible though.

You can check out my resume at http://michiel.trimpe.nl for a fairly polished three page CV that works well for the Dutch market.

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