In my college experience I have never had to write a cover letter for any reason. Whenever I apply to a company it is always handing my resume to them in a career fair, giving it to them at their place of business, or sending them my resume online. Before reading these articles, I thought it was stupid to reword your resume in sentence form just to have a very slight possibility of anyone ever reading it. I have never had to have a cover letter for any interview, career fair, or online submission form; so I kind of feel like I am wasting my time in writing one.
Before reading these articles I had no clue how to write a cover letter. Out of all three of these articles the one that really helped the most was the Instructor Blog 3. The instructor blog pointed out to me that the main purpose of a cover letter is to formally explain what you are applying for and to show why are better than the other applicants. The cover letter does a better job showing the employer how you will benefit the company and lets you explain in greater detail than what your resume does. This is really your opportunity to show how you can improve their company; rather than just stating your facts and your experiences.
I also found all of the different cover letter examples in the “Kairos and the Cover Letter” article to be helpful in showing what and what not to do in a cover letter.
When I write my cover letter I am going to follow the layout as given in the instructor blog. I am going to try and make a very concise introduction paragraph wherein I lead in my body paragraphs with several key terms. In my body paragraphs I am going to try not to state my accomplishments, but tell the reader how my accomplishments can help better their business. If it was not for reading these three articles I never would have had any clue how to write an effective cover letter.
Invisible Cover Letter
Yeah I never really thought that a cover letter was that important either. When I looked at the instructor's blog about how to write a cover letter I thought that there was a lot of good suggestions. I still am kind of confused on the length and the content of the document. The In-your-face explained in "Kairos and the Cover Letter" was shocking to me that someone would write a cover letter like that. The conversational point of view is a great way to explain why you are good for the job. Still, I think that if a resume is strong than a cover letter is not needed also.
Kairos and the cover letter
After looking at other responses and comparing yours, it is contradicting. The examples from Kairos and the cover letter, most people, including me, are referring to what type of example they are going to follow. Where if you read though that section one more time, “Here's a sample job ad, with a few strategies for addressing it in a cover letter (none of which works)” you can tell that most of us had a misconception of what was being emphasized by writing how we will use these examples rather than avoid. I know when going through this reading I didn’t catch it the first time due to skimming through this section and reading the sample rather than reading everything.
Zebulon Rouse
Ulterior motive
I think that a primary reason that cover letters exist at all is, as you have said, to further explain-in detail-what is written in your resume. However, I also think there is a somewhat ulterior motive for cover letters, that is to show the company just how personable you are and to determine if you are even interested in their company. If you simply spend the whole letter explaining how you are good at the things you said you can do in your resume and make no mention of the company-you've failed on some level. A cover letter like this would simply be to generic and could be sent to any company-not really ideal.
Show them how you'll help
I’ve had the same experience as you when applying for jobs/internships while in college: pretty much no one has ever asked for a cover letter. It kind of leads me to think that cover letters don’t serve that much of a purpose, considering nobody wants them. But I guess the readings that go along with English 421 are all knowing and all powerful; if they say cover letters are important, then so be it.
I think you nailed it when you said a cover letter is your opportunity to show how you can improve their company. I think it’s a place to apply your background and experiences directly to the job you’re looking at and show them why you’re an ideal candidate. Doing this conversationally goes a lot further than simply listing your accomplishments in a resume. But I still have a hard time taking cover letters seriously when, in my experiences, they just simply aren’t desired for entry-level positions.
Bad Examples
Do revisit the "Kairos and the Cover Letter" reading to discover that several of the examples were explicitly offered as bad examples.
CLARIFY
Just to clarify, I knew that all of the examples in "Kairos and the Cover Letter" WERE BAD EXAMPLES. I do not know why anyone thought that I was saying I thought they were good examples, considering I never state that in my response. In my reading response I said that the article told me what to do and what not do to when writing my cover letter, meaning that those examples gave me insight on what to say from reading the bad examples.
Thanks,
Joey