Band 5.5 IELTS Writing Task 2 Model Answer

Overall Band Score: 5.5 · Cambridge IELTS 11 · 2026-10-02

IELTS Writing Task 2 question

Employers sometimes ask people applying for jobs for personal information, such as their hobbies and interests, and whether they are married or single. Some people say that this information may be relevant and useful. Others disagree.

Discuss both these views and give your own opinion.

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

 

Student answer (Band 5.5)

Nowadays, employers often ask job application to provide personal information, including their hobbies, interests and marital status. Some intellectual believe that such information can help employers make better decisions, while another group of thinkers support it is irrelevant to person's ability to perform a job. In my perspective, job related personal information should normally be considered which is elaborated in the essay, citing relevant examples.

To begin with information about candidate' hobbies and interests the prime benefit is that sometimes be useful to employers. This means, a person's activities outside work may provide an indication of their personality and transferable skills. Furthermore, hobbies can help employers understand whether a candidate's personality is compatible with the working environment. This is to say, that certain profession, such information may provide useful additional evidence about an applicant. For example, In architecture field persons hobbies and interests helps to understand their creativity and way of thinking about their field.

On contrary, many people support that private information such marital status should not influence recruitment decisions. In other words, person's family situation has little or no connection with their professional qualifications, experience and skills. For instance, many private schools prefer to select married women as teacher because they believe they will be more responsible than young or freshers women. Moreover, many companies reject the applicant applications because they are married and believe that person will be focus on their family commitments not professional work. Beside, this such assumptions may prevent companies from selecting the most suitable candidate.

Finally, in my opinion, i firmly support the job related information should be considered. The main justification is employers get the opportunity to know about employee skills and personality and the way of thinking or they would be adjust in that work place or not.

To conclude, there are many advocates of asking personal information like marital status affect their professional life which has no connection of their degree and experience as well as people judge by their family commitments, however my arguments prove that personal interest help to know about their personality and demonstrate useful skill and adaptability.

AI examiner evaluation

Task Achievement / Task Response: Band 6.0

Your response addresses all parts of the task by discussing both views—whether personal information is relevant or irrelevant to recruitment—and you present your own opinion in the introduction and conclusion. However, some ideas are more fully developed than others, which places your response at this level. For instance, while you explain how hobbies can indicate creativity in architecture, your discussion of marital status relies on somewhat repetitive points regarding family commitments without fully exploring the broader implications for employers. Your position is clear throughout the essay, but extending and supporting all arguments with deeper reasoning would help elevate your task response further.

Coherence and Cohesion: Band 6.0

Your essay has a coherent overall arrangement with a clear attempt at paragraphing, where each paragraph focuses on a distinct aspect of the prompt. You use some transitional markers such as 'To begin with', 'On contrary', and 'To conclude' to guide the reader through your arguments. However, cohesion is sometimes mechanical or faulty, as seen in phrases like 'On contrary' instead of 'On the contrary', and some referencing lacks clarity, such as 'Beside, this such assumptions'. Additionally, the progression between sentences within paragraphs occasionally feels disjointed. Using a wider variety of cohesive devices more naturally and ensuring smoother transitions between ideas will help you achieve a higher band.

Lexical Resource: Band 5.5

You demonstrate an adequate range of vocabulary for the task, successfully attempting less common items such as 'transferable skills', 'compatible', and 'recruitment decisions'. However, there are noticeable errors in word choice, word form, and collocation that occasionally impede communication or appear unnatural, such as 'job application' instead of 'job applicants', 'intellectual' instead of 'intellectuals', and 'persons hobbies' with missing apostrophes. You also misuse 'freshers women' and 'job related'. While your spelling is generally acceptable, these recurring inaccuracies in lexical selection and word formation prevent you from reaching a higher band. Expanding your control of precise collocations and word forms will greatly strengthen your writing.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy: Band 5.0

You attempt a mix of simple and complex sentence forms, incorporating clauses introduced by 'such as', 'while', and 'because'. However, there are frequent errors in grammar and punctuation throughout the text that cause some difficulty for the reader. For example, you make errors in subject-verb agreement and clause structures, such as 'Some intellectual believe... while another group of thinkers support it is irrelevant', missing prepositions in 'in architecture field', and awkward phrasing like 'i firmly support the job related information should be considered'. Punctuation is also sometimes neglected around introductory phrases. Developing a better control over complex sentence structures and reducing basic grammatical errors will be essential for improving your grammar score.

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

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