Onterra TutorDoes optional attendance improve or harm university education?
TOEFL iBT writing question in the official format, with a full model answer and notes on why it scores. Write your own version below it and get an instant rater-style score.
The question
Your professor is teaching a class on education. Write a post responding to the professor's question. In your response, express and support your opinion and add to the discussion in your own words. A strong response has at least 100 words.
Professor Brant: Some universities now record every lecture and let students watch online instead of attending in person. Do you think optional attendance improves or harms university education?
Priya: Optional attendance respects students as adults. Many of us work part time, and recordings let us study when we can focus best instead of half asleep at 8 a.m.
Daniel: I see the appeal, but classes lose energy when the room is empty. Discussions, questions and group work cannot happen through a recording, and those are where real learning happens.
Model answer
In my view optional attendance improves education, but only when it is designed honestly. Priya's point about working students is not a detail, it is the reality of modern universities, and pretending everyone can attend at 8 a.m. simply punishes the poorest students. Daniel is right that discussion cannot be recorded, so my suggestion is to split the two functions: record every lecture, since a lecture is broadcast anyway, but keep seminars and group work in person and small. That way the part of education that benefits from flexibility becomes flexible, and the part that depends on human energy keeps its attendance expectation. Universities that blur this distinction get empty halls; universities that separate it get both access and engagement.
Why this answer scores
- Refuses the false binary and proposes a concrete policy, which shows the developed reasoning raters score highly.
- Engages both Priya and Daniel by name rather than writing a generic essay.
- The final sentence lands a memorable contrast, a hallmark of top responses.
Do not memorise model answers; raters recognise recycled essays instantly. Study the moves, then make them with your own ideas, and check where you stand with a scored practice.
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