Letter to Boss Requesting Reduced Hours for Study

You would like to reduce your working hours in order to study part time. Write a letter to your boss. In your letter • explain why you want to reduce your working hours • say which hours you would like to work • describe how your part-time studies would benefit your employer Dear ...,

Annotated response

8 correction notes

Dear Mr Henry,

I am writing to request you to reduce my daily working hours so that I can accommodate my part-time studies which are going to begin . I am taking a part-time Cybersecurity course at Hampton Center College, and I am hoping to get your approval to reduce my working hours so that I can continue the course.

The course will begin on the 2nd of March, and the classes and sessions will start at 4:00 pm on weekdays. To continue with the course, which I believe will be to our office, I need to reduce my daily working hours from 8 hours to 5 hours. I wish to at 9:00 am and work till 2:30 pm. The course will take just six months to complete and afterwards, I can resume working for 8 hours a day.

After I complete this course, I should be able to enhance our ability to protect sensitive data and prevent cyber threats. Since our company on digital systems, being able to identify vulnerabilities, implement best practices, and . I want to contribute to safeguarding our company data .

I would kindly request you to reduce my working hours so that I can enrol and successfully complete this course.

Thank you in advance.

Yours sincerely,

Joshua Carter

Overall assessment

Why this response received Band 7.5

The letter's strongest aspect is its full and purposeful coverage of all three bullet points with a consistently formal, polite register and concrete details such as dates and proposed hours. The main limitation is some repetition of the same request and rationale across paragraphs, along with occasional grammatical slips that slightly reduce the polish of otherwise controlled language.

IELTS criteria

How each score was decided

Task Achievement

8.0

The letter directly and fully addresses all three bullet points, explaining the Cybersecurity course, proposing exact working hours from 9:00 am to 2:30 pm, and outlining clear employer benefits, all in an appropriately formal tone.

Coherence and Cohesion

7.0

Ideas are logically sequenced across clear paragraphs with good linking devices, though some content, such as the request to reduce hours, is repeated in several places rather than progressing.

Lexical Resource

7.5

Vocabulary is flexible and largely precise for a formal request, with apt phrases like 'identify vulnerabilities' and 'comply with security protocols', despite minor awkwardness such as 'request you to reduce'.

Grammatical Range and Accuracy

7.5

A good range of complex structures is used with generally strong control, and the few errors, such as 'our company heavily rely' and 'implement best practices... are immensely important', are minor and non-impeding.