Art Teacher resume examples & templates

Since your job is all about helping students unleash their creativity, you might be wondering if there is any room for creative expression in your art teacher resume.

The answer is yes, there’s room for creativity, but you must do it right. A strong art teacher resume reflects your artistic side while also showcasing your professionalism and your talent as an educator. It allows you to provide a stunning first impression that school administrators and hiring managers won’t be able to ignore. 

Resume guide for an art teacher resume

Resume.io offers 500+ occupation-specific resume examples and writing guides. There’s also a resume builder that makes creating a compelling resume simpler than ever.

In this guide and corresponding art teacher resume example, we’ll explore the following:

• How to write an art teacher resume
• Sketching out your art teacher resume with the right structure and best format
• How to add your contact information
• Using summaries to show your skills
• Adding your art teacher experience
• Listing education and relevant experience
• Layout and design tips for a picture-perfect resume
• What the art education market looks like and what salary you can expect

How to write an art teacher resume

Whether you’re starting a new art project or preparing for next week’s classes, a plan is vital. Resume creation is no different. Before writing a word, be clear about the structure to follow. 

Your resume should contain the following elements:

• The resume header
• The resume summary (aka profile or personal statement)
• The employment history section
• The resume skills section
• The education section

Before taking a closer look at each part individually, let’s look at some universally important resume planning principles. They improve the odds of your resume being looked at for longer than the 10 seconds tops that busy recruiters spend on average skimming each one.

• Highlight accomplishments instead of simply listing job duties. Anyone can share the daily tasks they executed as a teacher, but your resume will be much more impactful if you display your specific accomplishments.
• Be concise. One or two pages at most.
• You need a custom-targeted resume for every new job application Match the content to the specific job requirements and gear the language and tone to the employer. Scrutinize the posted job ad and do your own research to pinpoint the hiring needs.
• Design your resume to effectively convey your aesthetic sense while remaining professional and clear.

Choosing the right resume format for an art teacher 

For art teachers with relevant experience, the chronological resume format is the best choice. It gives hiring managers a linear overview of your art teaching experience, organized in reverse chronological order from most recent to earliest jobs. 

If you are a self-employed art teacher or don’t have as many full-time teaching roles to list, the skills-focused functional format might work well. This format allows you to prominently highlight your skills at the top of the resume. The hybrid (combination) format is another option for art teachers with varied backgrounds where skills and employers both matter. There are several versions of all these formats available as resume examples.

When it comes to design, an art teacher resume should show some level of artistry but still appear professional and easy to read. We recommend a creative layout to get you started.

Include your contact information

Some creativity in the header of your art teacher resume can work in your favor, as long as it’s not distracting or gimmicky. An eye-pleasing first impression visually sets your job application apart. 

The practical purpose is to draw the reader’s attention to your identifying information and make it easy to find later when you are contacted for an interview. Focus on the following:

• Full name & title. List your first and last name and the title of the role you are pursuing.
• Professional email address. Use a simple and clean format like firstname.lastname@gmail.com. Avoid using a quirky or unprofessional email address.
• Phone number. List a number where you can be readily contacted, with a professional voicemail greeting and an inbox that can take new messages.
• Location. List only your city and state, not your full street address or zip code (that’s both outdated and unsafe). If you’re willing to relocate, note that here.
• LinkedIn. If your LinkedIn profile is active, relevant, and shows your educational expertise, include it here.
• Portfolio link, if you have one.

Don’t include:

• Date of birth. This isn’t necessary and could potentially lead to age discrimination.
• Personal details. Leave off your marital status, social security number, passport number, etc.
• Photo or headshot. It’s not customary to include headshots for education roles in the US, so please leave this off.

Make use of a summary

When you take over teaching for a new class, you introduce yourself and tell the students a bit about you. The summary of your art teacher resume does the same. It should provide a compact synopsis of your key experience and qualifications. It should also give a sense of your personality, passion, and purpose as an art teacher.

In 2-3 sentences, fill this section with a narrative about why you are the person the reader should hire. Using action verbs, showcase your talents and what sets you apart from the competition. Don’t simply rephrase your resume, however. Instead, pull everything together to show what traits, abilities, and experiences make you good at what you do. 

You can find adaptable art teacher resume example summaries below:

Outline your art teacher work experience

Metaphorically, this art teacher resume section is where you paint a textured landscape depicting your most colorful career highlights with overtones of future professional growth. 

Going back the last 10-15 years (not further), display your past positions from most recent to oldest. Under each employer heading, use dynamic action verbs to outline your work experience in descriptive bullet points. Selectively discuss the most relevant and relatable roles and accomplishments, focusing on beneficial outcomes. 

Think of ways to quantify with facts and figures. It’s easy to create a list of daily tasks, like this:

• “Taught art classes to students.”
• “Developed students’ skills.”
• “Coached students on various art mediums.”

While that certainly is part of an art teacher’s job, there’s nothing about these bullets that specifies your unique value. Think about what you can expand upon or quantify. Have you optimized class teaching time so your students gained more hands-on experience? Are there any noteworthy performance appraisal ratings? If art was an optional subject, did your course’s popularity boost enrollment? What about more cost-effective or eco-friendly purchasing and material usage? 

If hard data isn’t available, scope and scale metrics can make a difference: school size, student numbers, and frequency of classes. Mention exhibits and competitions you organized.

Look at how your bullets can transform:

• “Cultivated engaging classroom environments for classes of 20-25 students, inspiring creativity for grades 9-12.”
• “Provided expert education, building skill sets in art basics and achieving highest performance appraisal possible.”
• “Offered advanced instruction to higher grade students, coaching individuals in cultivating their unique vision and style through experimentation.”

“The fascinating thing is not to show the source of light, but the effect of light.”

— Edgar Degas

Take a look at the art teacher employment history resume sample below:

How to write an art teacher resume with no experience

While the majority of teaching jobs require experience, everyone starts somewhere. You may be a recent graduate or have only student teaching under your belt, so how can you craft a compelling resume without as much direct experience? 

Rely on your transferable skills. If you have any tutoring or training experience, that’s great to include. If you’re not a formally trained educator but have experience teaching English language learners, add that in. 

Don’t forget to include your education, especially anything related to education. You can also add past student teaching positions to explain what you've already begun learning in the field. 

Include the relevant key skills that make you a great art teacher

Your abilities as an artist and as a teacher no doubt add up to an exceptionally diverse mix of hard and soft skills. That’s what all hiring managers look for, regardless of the position or profession. 

Hard skills are those like teaching methodologies or training in particular artistic mediums. On the other hand, soft skills are things like communication skills, team management, or mentoring. 

To determine which skills belong on your art teacher resume, revisit the job post and make sure all the stipulated job requirements appear on your resume. Think of valuable skills that could set you apart from other contenders. For example, an art history specialization or teaching kids with special needs.

The resume builder offers several pre-written key skills to choose from, as well as the option to add your own skills. 

Here’s what the skills box looks like in our art teacher resume template. 

However, this list isn’t the only place to add your key skills. To provide the most value, weave them throughout your resume by demonstrating them in action. Providing specific examples and achievements enhances your credibility further. 

For example, within your work experience and summary sections, highlight your:

• Education expertise by describing your educational credentials, grades and classes you’ve taught, and any achievement metrics like high elective enrollment or increased test scores
• Artistry by detailing your background as an artist and experience with various mediums
• Technical skills by demonstrating your fluency in relevant educational software or systems

Detail your education & relevant art teacher certifications

Except for some community or private instructors, the formal education requirements for art teachers are relatively clear-cut. 

Your education section should start by listing your degrees in reverse chronological order from highest to lowest level. Since you’ve likely got at least a university degree, you can leave off information about high school. 

Beyond your formal education, there are other important pieces to include in this section. For example:

• Training and certificates. A teaching certificate or any specific training you’ve undergone that may be relevant (either to art or education in general) can be helpful.
• Internships and student teaching. Include information about student teaching assignments or relevant internships.
• Licenses and memberships. List applicable state certifications and licenses as well as professional memberships, along with any awards or special honors.

Pick the right resume layout and design for an art teacher resume

As an artist, you know more than most about the design principles that are integral to aesthetic appeal. Naturally, hiring managers will expect your art teacher resume to look as good as it sounds. The document must be inviting to read while proving easy to follow, so the visual aspects of layout, design, and formatting are interlinked considerations.

There’s room for creativity to make sure your content stands out. That said, don’t add too many graphic elements and colors, as they can detract from reader-friendliness.

An uncomplicated, well-ordered layout enables recruiters to spot what they’re looking for in labeled sections. A balance between black text blocks and white space is essential, so adhere to the default one-inch margin settings. Open up the line and paragraph spacing. No more than two legible and compatible font styles are advisable—one for body text and another for headings—and neither should be fancy.

Even graphic design whizzes don’t always have the time or inclination to deal with document design details when preoccupied with their job search. And you don’t need to! Resume.io’s ready-made resume templates offer a faster and easier path to stunning results.

Art teacher text-only resume example

Art teacher job market and outlook

Art teachers work in several types of institutions, spanning different grade levels and ages. Jobs for elementary school teachers are expected to decline over the next decade, although not drastically, as are middle school and high school teaching jobs. 

On the other hand, jobs in postsecondary education are expected to increase. 

What type of salary you can expect in art education 

Art teachers, like the majority of educators, are typically paid an annual salary. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported that the median annual salary for postsecondary art, drama, and music teachers is $80,360.

Aside from postsecondary education, art teachers are not categorized separately from other teachers in most Bureau of Labor Statistics data, which shows the following median pay:

• Kindergarten / elementary school teachers: $63,670 per year
• Middle school teachers: $64,290 per year
• High school teachers: $65,220 per year

According to Salary.com, the average art teacher salary is $60,184, while Glassdoor shows an average of $54,784.

Key takeaways for building an art teacher resume

As a lack of employment growth tightens job competition, a stand-out art teacher resume is essential. Approach each job application from the standpoint of showing how you can benefit the employer and your future students. Each resume section should reinforce that your artistic talents and teaching abilities are an ideal job match.

Kickstart your art teacher job search with our online resume builder, then supercharge it with resume.io. 

Unlock 18 powerful tools to search for jobs, track your progress, ace your interviews, and negotiate the best salary—all within our comprehensive career toolkit.