IELTS Speaking Test- Excellent Band 9.0

let's start off with asking you do you work or do you study I work actually um so I co-founded the startup it's called secure my scholarship it's an ettech platform that connects students with scholarships at universities around the world so I I work full-time longer than full-time of you may say what do you love about your job I love the impact that we create man uh so we give you know students that come from hardworking middleclass families or workingclass families a chance at going to the University of their dreams and personally I love that about

what we do did you always want to do that job this specifically no but have I always wanted to work in something that would allow me to create an impact yes everything I've ever done in my life has been around companies with impact or with social causes and somebody once asked me if I wasn't with secure my scholarship what would you do and I said I'd work at a nonprofit is there anything that you dislike about your job me personally no but if you ask my fiance she will tell you that I my job takes

up a lot of my time and I think she hates that about my job would you like to do any other job in the future I got my hands for with secure my scholarship right now but in the future who knows you know I mean uh I love solving problems and helping make people's lives better um and the world has a lot of issues so you know who knows now let's talk about mobile phones how often do you use your mobile phone oh I use my mobile phone every day the company basically runs off my

MobileOne phone what are some of your favorite apps uh I use LinkedIn a lot um I use a productivity tool called Asana it allows me to like track my tasks and manage my day I use slack a lot uh internal team communication WhatsApp obviously I mean everybody uses WhatsApp uh and yeah couple apps not that many I'm not one of those guys with 1,500 apps on their phone I have about eight or nine apps that I use do you think that you use your phone too much Times Yes uh you know it's funny that you

asked that uh before secure my scholarship uh myself and the same founding team we actually founded a startup called lock in stock it was a mobile app that basically rewarded you with offers and discounts for not using your phone when you were in class we wanted to kind of help students pay attention more in class learn better um do better in their studies and then when they were done they could get you know buy one get one free at the pizza place or something like that so yeah now let's talk about your school did you

enjoy school that is a tough question um when I was in school I hated it but I think the beauty with school is that the later in life you go the more you begin to appreciate the school that you went to who was your favorite teacher my favorite teacher uh my favorite teacher was a was a woman named Mrs mik Menan uh she she was my math teacher in grades 10 and 11 and and um I really liked her classes and I really enjoyed them and what specifically did you dislike about school um I went

to a school that made academic performance very very important everything revolved around okay do better you got to do better your grades all of that stuff much to the neglect of maybe extracurriculars or Sports I played cricket and football in high school and I remember we wouldn't have any training practices any practice matches we wouldn't do go to any tournaments or we'd go to very few tournaments um and I didn't particularly like that when I was in school the focus on academics and not really on other stuff describe a period of time from your studies

that was difficult I'd say the hardest time during my studies that was difficult was when I was in university I think second or third year of University to go to the university that I went to it required a lot of effort I think my parents really saved to send me to University and I had to get a bunch of scholarships and all of that stuff I wanted to make the most of it but I didn't quite know how to do that I was majoring in economics but I also wanted to study this class and this

class and this class and all of that stuff and really make the most of my time because I was lucky to be at the University that I went to um this was perhaps 2015 2016 second or third year of University um it was hard because um I had only a limited amount of time and had to fit all of this stuff in um but I think through that experience and I came out very well through that experience I learned I think I learned time management you know just actually breaking down what I wanted to do

how I wanted to do it I had to schedule out my day and my week very very very well and really just make it happen for myself and that was super difficult right because uh the school I went to everything was given to you on a platter these are your classes this is what you got to do but at University I had to basically make my own schedule and if you were doing a simple major and that was it then you know no harm no foul that's very clearcut whatever when I graduated University I graduated

with a major in economics and minors in political science international relations mass communication and business administration I would have had another minor in finance as well so I had four minors that I graduated with along with my major and I would had a fifth minor as well um and to make all of this work and just fit it into my schedule super difficult but as I said you know I I was lucky to be a university when I was and I wanted to make the most of my time there so we've been talking about a

difficult time you had at University and we're going to continue to talk about University education and higher education in general should higher education be free to all citizens to thank you for watching this video I want to give you a free course that has helped thousands of students improve their I speaking score what it's going to do is take you through through every single part of the test and give you strategies for part one part two and part three and also allow you to practice at home for free and get feedback to sign up for

that for free all you have to do is just click the link in the description thanks very much and let's get back to the video in an Ideal World yes I think the cost of quality education today is incredibly expensive and is rising year over-year um what happens with that is that this phenomenal then prices out so many people from the middle class and the working class who aren't given the same opportunities it shouldn't be that okay only if you can afford to pay $150,000 a year you can go to a top 10 business school

around the world and succeed in life I mean that's that's not fair it shouldn't have to be that way um I through secure my scholarship I remember there was this one girl two weeks ago who applied for an MBA in the USA and the cost of that MBA was like $65,000 which I mean $65,000 is a lot of money and especially when you're earning in rupees in India that's a hell of a lot of money now I mean what's her solution I mean should she give up on her dreams should she not go ahead and

do it I mean what is what does she do she applied through our platform we helped her get a $25,000 scholarship to bring her fees down from $65,000 to 40,000 we can't make it free unfortunately we're not the government we're not God or the government or whatever we can't make it free but we can minimize it as much as we can I remember I was on a call with her and just the the look of excitement on her face when she got this because she was taking a loan to do go do her MBA and

we effectively cut her loan by half and that's amazing should scholarships only be given to gifted children in a world with finite resources I I suppose I guess this is a tricky question right because if there are own n number of seats and there's a cost that is why and whatever then you have to ensure that students who are I guess U academically talented or talented at a sporting level or an athletic level or whatever are able to get that push that they need because there are only limited seats so you know if they're not

going to get it then somebody else is going to get the seat and they're going to miss out so in that scenario yes scholarships and when I in this scenar in this sense I mean 100% scholarships should be given to gifted children because they've displayed um some sort of aptitude or level where they can succeed and they should be given that push I think now who determines how scholarships are given out and I know there's a lot of Foul Play at the University level or you know this guy is my cousin's kid so give him

100% scholarship it shouldn't be like that there should be an unbiased uh counsil that has to vote and decide or however these things are done but it should be fair but in a world with limited seats and limited opportunities I guess you know you have to make sure that students who are who display a level of talent get access to those scholarships I suppose but again just coming back to the previous question if if every student was allowed to study that's a much more Ideal World I think some people think that Charities should uh provide

gifted children with scholarships and other people think that the government should do it who do you think should provide scholarships to thank you for making it this far in the video I want to give you 10% off our VIP course I VIP course is the most successful I course in the world that is a fact because we have more band seven eight and nine success stories than any other I course in the entire world we do that by simplifying the whole is process supporting you with some of the best is teachers in the world and

being with you every step of the way until you get the score that you need all you have to do is just look down in the description just click that and you can sign up if you have any questions about the VIP course always feel free to get in touch with us we answer 100% of the questions that we get hope that you become a VIP if not enjoy the rest of this free video can I say everyone um I mean the government uh see it's in the government's best interests to ensure that its best

and brightest receive the best education possible because they will then contribute to society so it's in the government's best interest to do it uh from a charity or a nonprofit standpoint 100% um I actually so someone once asked me I I was on like a like another uh someone once asked me I was having a discussion and they asked me you know Craig if secure my scholarship you know just becomes this huge company and you you exit someday you know what are you going to do and you know my my my ambition at least if

I have the resources uh my ambition in life is to someday open schools not university schools at the primary level or up to the Middle School level and make it free just for any student to come and get a great education for free literally so that's something that I am passionate about that's also why I work a 100 hours a week on secure my scholarship um so I mean if there's a charity or a nonprofit that's committed to this cause then 100% um and the third I guess stakeholder is the universities themselves I mean let's

let's get one thing straight right universities are incredibly wealthy institutions you look at not even your top 20 or top 30 you look at your top 200 universities in the US in the UK they have billion doll endowment funds that are invested into you know some uh some invested into government bonds or t- builds or or whatever it may be uh there are billion I think Harvard's endowment fund is 40 billion or 50 billion I mean don't quote me on that but it's it's in that ballark range that's a lot of money from a un

iversity standpoint as well um I I I feel like it should just be a part of their social responsibility to give back to the community that has given them so much that's what I think how will third level education change in the future I think tary education u university education is going to get more creative it's already happening as well but I mean these like higher education is something that it will never go through like a a sudden like shift a lot of people said after Co everything will be online physical campuses are done whatever

and that just wasn't to be I mean even till today we have students who apply through secure my scholarship for oncampus classes and and online classes and 99% of students are applying for oncampus classes um online just didn't shake up the industry like everybody predicted but I think the real change is in the mode of Education itself gone are the days where you have to go to class take notes memorize come back next week and regurgitate that on a test or an exam that that that doesn't work anymore you're not training people the right way

because today if you need information there's Google there's chat GPT and probably a lot of other resources that can't come to mind right now but information is available at your fingertips what you need to train people about or train people for today is how to utilize this information how well can you analyze the information in front of you how well can you use the data that you have available to you um do you know where to look how well can you think through the problem to then break it down to then find the solution in

this sea of information available on the internet how well can you do these things how creatively can you think through a problem and figure out a solution these are things that cannot be replaced very easily by you know chat GPT or Google or whatever this these are the skills of the future memorization and answering questions on an exam is it's not really required anymore and I think this this shift is already happening and will really become more profound maybe 10 or 15 years from now well done that's the end of the speaking test awesome thank

you so much so full disclosure Craig is not one of our students we've never taught him English he's never attended any of our a courses or anything anything like that we want to be 100% honest with you guys but I noticed Craig online and he's an Indian national who I think you will agree has reached a level in English which is unbelievable he's easily a b nine uh if there was anything above a band nine I think uh Craig would get there also Craig as he mentioned a few times in the interview runs a company

called secure my scholarship Isles Advantage has no affiliation we're not sponsored by them we won't make any money if you go there but we thought that it would be a great opportunity for our audience because a lot of our audience hopes to go to university but you might be struggling financially Craig if you sign up for secure my scholarship he guarantees is that correct guarantees and it's absolutely free absolutely free and he guarantees to get you know at least something off a scholarship and could save you potentially thousands if not tens of thousands of dollars

uh attending some of the best universities in the world up to you if you want to visit there I would recommend it but as I said we don't make any money from it but thank you so much Craig it was great listening to you and I'm sure people learned a lot from your performance and I'm hope that some of them check out your website as well thank you so much for having me Chris I really appreciate it thank you so much for having me and best of luck with your with your company thank you