THE INFLUENCE OF THE SCIENTIFIC WORK PREPARATION WORKSHOP ON INCREASING THE ACADEMIC WRITING COMPETENCE OF MAJENE OPEN UNIVERSITY STUDENTS

Abstract

Academic writing competence is an essential skill for students but often becomes a major obstacle, including for students of the Open University (Universitas Terbuka - UT) Majene. This study aims to analyze the influence of conducting a scientific writing workshop on improving the academic writing competence of UT Majene students. The research method used was a quasi-experiment with a one-group pretest-posttest design. A total of 30 students actively taking their final project/thesis course were selected as samples using purposive sampling technique. The research instrument was an essay test to measure the ability to write a research proposal, administered before (pretest) and after (posttest) the workshop intervention. The workshop was conducted over 16 hours of meetings covering core materials on writing the problem background, problem identification, formulation of research objectives and benefits, and literature review. The obtained data were analyzed statistically using a paired sample t-test to determine the significant difference between pretest and posttest scores. The results showed a significant increase in the students' average writing ability score, from 55.20 in the pretest to 78.45 in the posttest. The t-test results strengthened this finding with a significance value (p) of 0.000 < 0.05, meaning H0 is rejected and Ha is accepted. It is concluded that the scientific writing workshop proven to have a positive and significant influence on improving the academic writing competence of UT Majene students. The implication of this research emphasizes the importance of institutions conducting similar training sustainably and structuredly to empower students' academic skills, particularly in preparing for thesis writing.