How higher education students write their thesis: Preparation, difficulties, and obstacles

Abstract

Writing a thesis is the ultimate goal of higher education. Before writing, all the courses taken in previous semesters are a stock of knowledge for writing a thesis. However, students still face many problems when writing a thesis. The purpose of this research is to describe the readiness of students to write a thesis, the difficulties in writing thesis components, and internal barriers to writing a thesis. The respondents of this research were 105 students of the Faculty of Economics and Business at one of the private universities in Jakarta. The research methods used are descriptive qualitative and quantitative. Data was collected using Google Forms and Focus Group Discussion. This study found that 63% of respondents have good skills in using Indonesian in formal writing, and 52% understand scientific writing techniques well enough. However, 61% have not yet utilized the Mendeley reference manager. As many as 29% of respondents have difficulty in compiling literature reviews, 27% in research methods, 25% in results and discussion (25%), and 14% in introduction (14%). In general, obstacles arise due to laziness and being stuck when working on a thesis.