Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 21 · 2026-09-14

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

All university undergraduate courses should include a period of time spent studying abroad or doing a work placement.

Do you think the advantages of this would outweigh the disadvantages?

Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience.

Student answer (Band 5.5)

Education is the oldest and integral part of human life, It plays a fundamental role in both individual development and the progree of society. However, people do think that education makes a task more convenient ,accessible and open doors for a better future. In my opinion university should aware students about abroad studies and also for short term placement opportunity.

One important reason for inversting in abroad study is to get a international exposure.An individual get exposed to new language, culture , meeting new people will leads to broad up their holisticalthinking . These international internships will boost up the profile of a student. Subsequently, abrod study sometimes do provide better research and development opportunity those who were seeking for it. These implementation and international environment sometimes create a big impact on student career and they will contribute to society in their terms.

On the otherhand, some students do get affected by foreign study such as getting culture shock, language barrier , difficulty to adapat enternal environment . A part from that spending a semester abroad will creates heavy burden on the pockets of students who were financially unviable, it also took them into debts. Overall Advantages will easily outweight the disadvantages. For instance a study from oxford university states that those students who done their semester abroad came out to be more successfull in terms of studies and financially.

To conclude , government should invest in education because it benefits both individual and society . Government should make regulations , university start to invest in research and development and parents invest in their child study.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response — Band 5.5

You have addressed all parts of the prompt by discussing both the advantages and disadvantages of studying abroad or doing a work placement during undergraduate courses, and you successfully presented a clear position. For example, you noted that international exposure and internships boost a student's profile, while acknowledging potential drawbacks like culture shock and financial burdens. However, some of your ideas are slightly under-developed and lack extension. For instance, the point regarding Oxford University is stated broadly without sufficient supporting detail. To reach a higher band, ensure that every main point is fully elaborated with deeper explanations or more precise examples. Overall, your response meets the core requirements of the task.

Coherence and Cohesion — Band 5.5

Your essay has a clear overall arrangement with an introduction, body paragraphs, and a conclusion. You attempted to use cohesive devices and transition signals, such as 'One important reason', 'On the otherhand', and 'To conclude'. However, there are some issues with referencing and mechanical cohesion. For instance, the transition 'A part from that' contains a spacing error, and paragraphing could be managed more effectively, as the final conclusion introduces new ideas about government regulations rather than summarising the main arguments of your essay. Logical progression is occasionally disrupted by abrupt shifts between sentences. To improve, ensure smoother transitions and keep your concluding paragraph focused solely on a summary of your main points.

Lexical Resource — Band 5.5

You have demonstrated an adequate vocabulary range for the task, attempting some less common words and phrases such as 'holistical thinking', 'international internships', and 'financial unviable'. However, there are numerous spelling and word-choice errors throughout your text, including 'progree' instead of progress, 'inversting' instead of investing, 'abrod' instead of abroad, and 'adapat' instead of adapt. Furthermore, some collocations are unnatural, such as 'heavily burden on the pockets'. These lexical inaccuracies and spelling mistakes indicate that your vocabulary control is at the Band 5.5 level. Focusing on accurate word forms and proofreading your spelling will help elevate your score in this criterion.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy — Band 5.0

You have used a mix of simple and complex sentence forms in your response, such as conditional and relative structures like 'those students who done their semester abroad came out to be more successfull'. However, your writing contains frequent grammatical errors, particularly with subject-verb agreement ('university should aware', 'spending a semester abroad will creates'), missing articles, and awkward phrasing ('those who were seeking for it'). Punctuation is also problematic, with incorrect comma splices and spacing around punctuation marks. While these errors do not completely impede communication, they occur with enough frequency to prevent you from achieving a higher band. Working on complex sentence accuracy and checking your verb forms will greatly benefit your grammatical control.

See this exact question answered at other band scores — the same prompt compared across bands.

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