Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 21 · 2026-09-26

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)

All university undergraduate courses should include a period of time spent studying abroad or doing a work placement has become increasingly common in recent years. Although it offers several advantages are help them to develop skills according to there intrests and it provide students with valuable practical experience. It also has some disadvantages but advantages overweigh it.

To begin with, one major advantage of all university undergraduate courses should include a period of time spent studying abroad or doing a work placement are this kind of courses help them to develop skills and get hands on experience according to there intrests.This is because a student who is intrested in placement will focus on the placement training and attend multiple exams to crack placement for there career development.In contrast, students who are keen about there higher studies gathers the information about different countries and various courses available there and starts the required documentaion process. For example, as a undergraduate student i choose to study abroad right from the moment i started gathering the requried information and started preparation for exams that are required for my admission. Therefore, studying abroad had greater global exposure so they can fit in any environment in their work place.

However, one significant disadvantage is that studying abroad program is expensive. This is because course fee, travel expenses, accommodation all there are included. For instance, due to all the conditions a stressfull environment is formed and finincial conditions play major role. As a result, students prefer work placement program.

However, I believe studying abroad program is expensive is less significant than the advatages because of the global exposure they gain.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 5.5

The response addresses the prompt by discussing the advantages and disadvantages of including study abroad or work placements in undergraduate courses, and takes a clear position that the advantages outweigh the disadvantages. However, the development of ideas is limited and repetitive. The introduction awkwardly copies the prompt question as the subject of the sentence ('All university undergraduate courses should include... has become increasingly common'). The body paragraphs tend to circle back to the same points about skill development and global exposure without fully extending the arguments with precise elaboration. Furthermore, the discussion of disadvantages lacks depth, focusing solely on expenses and stress. Because the main parts of the task are addressed but the supporting arguments remain somewhat underdeveloped, this performance aligns best with Band 5.5 to 6.0, settling at a Band 6.0 for covering the core requirements.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 5.5

The essay displays a generally coherent overall arrangement with clear attempts at paragraphing and basic signposting phrases such as 'To begin with', 'In contrast', and 'However'. Nevertheless, cohesion is frequently mechanical and faulty. The referencing is often unclear, particularly with pronoun use like 'help them' and 'about there', where the antecedents are muddled. Paragraph structuring also suffers from repetition and abrupt transitions, such as the single-sentence concluding paragraphs that fail to effectively synthesize the arguments. While logical progression is attempted, the intrusive mechanical transitions and inadequate referencing keep the text below a Band 7. The structural flaws are consistent with Band 5.5, which rounds to a Band 6.0 given the clear paragraph divisions and overall progression.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.0

The vocabulary used is adequate for the task, allowing the student to communicate basic ideas about career development, global exposure, and expenses. However, there is a noticeable presence of spelling errors (e.g., 'intrests', 'there' instead of 'their', 'documentaion', 'finincial', 'stressfull', 'advatages') and awkward word choices. The range is somewhat limited, and attempts at less common vocabulary often result in inaccuracies. While the lexical errors do not completely impede communication, they occur with high enough frequency across the text to prevent the score from reaching a Band 6. Therefore, the lexical resource demonstrated matches the Band 5 descriptors.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0

The student attempts a mix of simple and complex sentence forms, utilizing relative clauses and conditional structures. However, grammatical accuracy is weak throughout the response. There are frequent errors in subject-verb agreement (e.g., 'advantages are help', 'courses include... are this kind of courses help', 'studying abroad program is expensive'), punctuation issues, and missing articles. For instance, the opening sentence fails grammatically because an entire clause is used as a singular noun phrase without proper embedding. Although some sentences are clear, the high frequency of grammatical errors causes noticeable difficulty for the reader and prevents the writing from achieving a Band 6. The control of grammar aligns best with Band 5.

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