Children’s education is expensive. In some countries, governments pay partly or all education fees. Do the advantages outweigh the disadvantages?
Sample Response
In recent yearsyear, there is a growing concern among governmentsa growing consideration for the government in termsterm of children'schild education, particularly the payment of tuition feesparticularly payment for their tuition fees. Although this policy brings certain drawbacks, I believe that the benefits are much greater.
On the one hand, the policy of government-funded educationfree education charge may place a heavydramatic burden on the national budget. The government may have to pour money in education, therefore financial fund could have not enough for other sectors such as infrastructure and medical care, which may hold the economy back from development. In addition, some taxpayers who live alone or do not have children may feel unfairly treatedmay feel unfair because their money is likely to be spentbecause their money is likely spent for the sake of othersfor sake of others, not for their own benefitnot for theirs.
However, I would argue that the benefits of free tuitionthe benefit of free of tuition fee should receive greater considerationshould be more considered. First, education is strongly encouragedFirst, among these is studying is definitely encouraged, which leadslead to the reduction of the illiteracy rate. As a result, the children who go to school will have more chanceschance to find a job, and they would be the future workforce for the country. Take Singapore as an example, they have sponsored education fee for their young generation, which encourages them to go to schools or universities, this is reasons why Singapore has a high qualified manpower contributing for their development. Another significant advantage is that family may not be worried about financial burden because of high education fee, and they would have more money to take care nutrition and health care for their children.
In conclusion, it seems to me that free charge of education would bring more benefits than its disadvantage.
Why this response received Band 6.5
The essay takes a clear position and develops relevant benefits, especially improved access to education, literacy, employment, and relief for family budgets. Its main limitation is language control: frequent grammatical and collocational errors make some explanations and the Singapore example difficult to follow, while the fiscal disadvantage receives less development. Prioritise rewriting each main claim in shorter accurate sentences and explaining how the educational gains outweigh the budgetary cost.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Response
The response addresses both disadvantages and advantages, maintains a clear position, and develops several relevant educational and household benefits.
Compare the long-term educational gains directly with the budgetary cost to demonstrate more convincingly why the advantages are greater.
Coherence and Cohesion
The four-part structure creates clear overall progression, although linking is sometimes mechanical and the Singapore example becomes an overloaded run-on sentence.
Split the Singapore evidence into separate claim, example, and explanation sentences with unambiguous references.
Lexical Resource
There is adequate topic-specific vocabulary, but frequent combinations such as 'free education charge' and 'high qualified manpower' are inaccurate.
Use natural phrases such as 'tuition-free education', 'allocate funds to education', and 'a highly qualified workforce'.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
The essay attempts varied sentence forms, but agreement, article, number, and clause-structure errors occur frequently while meaning remains mostly clear.
Proofread each clause for a complete subject and verb, then check plural agreement in forms such as 'benefits' and 'families'.
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IELTS Writing Task 2
Children’s education is expensive. In some countries, governments pay partly or all education fees. Do the advantages outweigh the disadvantages?
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.