AN ANALYSIS OF STUDENTS’ ABILITY IN WRITING APPLICATION LETTER A STUDY AT TWELVE GRADE OF SMKN 1 TARUSAN
Kety Rahtu Marsota
(Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris, STKIP PGRI West Sumatera, [email protected]) Pembimbing 1: M. Khairi Ikhsan, M.Pd dan Pembimbing 2: Rika Afriyanti, M.Pd
Abstrak
Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengetahui dan melihat kemampuan siswa dalam menulis surat lamaran pekerjaan ( application letter). Menjelaskan bagaimana siswa menggunakan aturan – aturan dengan mempertimbangkan bagian – bagian surat , struktur surat dan bahasa yang di gunakan dalam menulis surat lamaran pekerjaan (application letter) . Penelitian ini adalah penelitian descriptive quantitative qualitative..
Populasi penelitian ini adalah siswa kelas duabelas SMKN 1 Tarusan tahun akademik 2015/2016 jurusan Teknik Sepeda Motor, Teknik Otomotif Kendaraan Ringan, Teknik Gedung dan Bangunan dan Teknik Audio Video, sedangkan samplenya adalah siswa - siswa yang menjadi perwakilan dari siswa kelas duabelas. Dalam pengumpulan data, peneliti memberikan test berbentuk writing test mengenai application letter.Peneliti menganalisa hasil tulisan siswa dengan menggunakan rubrik dan membuat skoring tabulasi siswa, yang mana menggambarkan bagaimana hasil siswa dalam menulisan surat lamaran pekerjaan.Peneliti menemukan bahwa siswa memiliki kemampuan menengah sebagian siswa tergolong bagus di bagian organization, content, appearance dan language usage of application letter. Pada sisi lain, peneliti menemukan siswa belum bisa menulis surat lamaran pekerjaan yang sesuai dengan rubrik penilaian dalam surat lamaran pekerjaan.
Key Words: Writing application Letter, students’ ability A. Introduction
Writing is an important skill in English beside listening, speaking and reading that should be learned by any language learners. It can be alternative way to carry out communication, because through writing, people can communicate a variety of messages in a long distance. Besides, people can express their idea, opinion, or feeling in various forms such as in papers, books, poems, letters, Paragraphs, short stories, novels, or research reports. However, the writer assumed that writing is the most difficult skill for the students to be mastered. Writing is considered as a difficult skill, even in one’s own native language. One reason that writing is so difficult relates to the fact that, it needs more concentrations to express ideas that must be presented clearly and organized. The explanation above is supported by Boardman and Frydenberg (2002:2) who state that the purpose of writing is to communicate a message. It means that a writer has to pay much attention to the ideas conveyed in written form in order to make the reader understand about the meaning of messages that the writer intends. Buisness letter is one of several types of text that should be written by vocational school’s students as a place to express their competency in business as their program. A kind of business letter which should be mastered well by the students is application letter, because this letter aims to
get a job application from an employer in facing business field later. Dealing to explanation above, the twelve grade of vocational high school is expected to improve their ability in writing. Moreover, in the preliminary observation at twelve grade of SMKN 1 Tarusan the researcher found the majority phenomena of students should be able to write application business letter by considering the part of the letters, forms and the language features. This writing material has to learn and mastered by all programs of the twelve grade students at SMKN 1 Tarusan.
Thus, in this study researcher describes the students’ ability in writing application business letter.
B. Writing application Letter
Writing is one of the subject matter which should be learn in the school about writing application letter. According to Liming (2009:2) good applications letters broadcast someone abilities. It tells employers how someone qualifications match a job’s responsibilities. If the letter preliminaries are constructed well, someone has a better chance of landing interviews – and eventually a job. It can be concluded that someone who wants to get a job from an employer should state their qualification clearly to get the employer interest.Besides, Mayer (2011:65) explains that an application letter used to apply for a specific job and always goes with someone
resume. As the first thing that the hiring manager will see, it needs to connect someone, his/her skills and experience to the job opening. It means the in application letter the applicant should promotes his/her skills and job experiences before, in order to make the employer think that the applicant can be considered to work in his/her company.
To create an effective job application letter, someone have to present his/herself by considering some characteristics of the letter like an first introduction to the person who could be the new employer. According to Krizan, Merrier, Logan and Williams (2008:495-501) the application letters use in job campaign must meet same neatness, accuracy, clarity and conciseness standards as resumes. Application letter should be brief, generally no more than 1 to 1½ pages. Good general application letter may contain: first, uses name and title as the name address of the letter. Second, names specific skills for employment. Third, relates skills or experiences to the company’s needs. Fourth, refers to resume that being sent with the letter.
Last, arranges for easy contact. Next, Liming (2009:5) defines the essential characteristics of a application letter assembling the following information about the worker candidate in advance will make it easier to complete applications: a).Identification. Be prepared to give name, address, phone number and social security number. Someone may also need to bring proof of identification when he/she pick up and drop off the application. b).
Employment history. List the month and year started and ended each job; supervisor’s name, address and phone number; the job title, location, salary and major duties and the reason for leaving. c). Education and certification. Know the name and city of the schools attended and the year received degrees and the name, level and award and renewal dates of certification. d). Special skills. List any special skills which have that are closely related to the job, such as computer applications or equipment operation. e).
References. Provide the names, phone numbers and addresses of three or four people who have agreed to recommend you.
In writing application letter, some one should be consider standard business format with addresses at the top and signature
above typed name at the bottom and follows some parts or the letter format. The letter format will take part in an application letter and arrange the letter become neatly, short, and clearly explain.According Liming (2009:10) point outs that there are four parts of application letter as follow: 1) Salutation as the specific person to the office check that the name of the worker candidate use is spelled correctly and the title is accurate.2) Opening.
The first few sentences of the letter should tell the reviewer which job of the worker candidate is applying for and the connection he/she has to the company. 3) Body. The next portion of the letter is a brief explanation of the worker’s candidate qualifications, most relevant qualifications or provides additional details about a noteworthy accomplishment. 4) Closing. At this final paragraph thank to the reviewer, request and interview and repeat the phone number.Careers and Employment Provides (2013:2) also shows a details possible format for an application letter as follow: 1) Name and address. 2) The dates of the letter write. 3) The person and the employer’s address that the worker candidate is writing to, includes the person’s name and title. 4) Salutation. 5) The reason of the letter is writing. a) In response to a job advertisement is needed to quote in detail : b) Seeking to be considered for any vacant positions which might become available. 6) State a personality introducing and education : a) Distil five lines from the worker candidate resumes. b) Include the lasts qualification or the details of the degree are currently completing. c) Mention the university and any majors studied and a project or interest area if relevant. 7) Marketing or state qualification : a) Experience/skills developed which are relevant.b). Include reasons for wanting this particular job. c)The reason of the worker candidate interest in the employer. d) Any benefits of the worker candidate bring to the job or company. 8) Other documents which may include : a) Resume, selection criteria, academic record. b) Provide details on how to contact. c) How, when and where the worker candidate can be contacted for an interview. d) Include semester, home or holiday contact and hours of contractibility. 9) Closure : a) Use
“your sincerely” if you address the person by name. b) Use “your faithfully” if you do not know the person’s name. c) Sign the letter above typed name.
C. Research Method
This research design was descriptive research, because researcher tried to analyze the students’ writing ability on application letter. According to Gay and Airisian (2000:11) descriptive research is used to investigate the variety of educational problems and issues. It means that descriptive research is a research started of collecting and analyzing data to find the answer of question. In this research, the researcher answered the research question and analyzed students’ ability in writing application letter by analyze the students’ writing test about the business letter, especially in application letter at the XII grade of SMKN 1 Kabupaten Pesisir Selatan. That consisted of six programs and total of the population was 159 college students. The researcher do research at Monday, 14th September 2015 until Monday 21th June 2015.
A research was also begin by gather some data from a sample that are gained from the entire of participants. Gay and Airasian (2000:212) stated that, sampling is the process of selecting a number of individuals who represent the large group from which they were selected. A sample comprises the individuals, items, or events selected from a large group referred to as population. In this case, the writer would use random sampling technique to collect the data. Random sampling was the process of selecting a sample in such a way that all individuals in the defined population have an equal and independent chance of being selected for the sample (Gay and Airasian, 2000: 123). This sampling technique considers 10% to 20%
population becomes sample of a research.
Based on the experts’ explanation, the researcher takes 15% from 159 total population. As the result, the researcher got 23,85 or about 24 sample from 159 of the total population. Then, the researcher would divide 24 sample spread into 6 classes at the twelfth grade students of SMKN 1 Kabupaten Pesisir Selatan West Sumatera. Thus, the researcher got 4 students was taken from each class.
Besides that, writing test is instrumention that can be used in collecting data. In gathering the data in the field, the researcher would do some steps. First, the researcher prepared some sheet to distribute to the participants. The sheet consisted by instruction about writing an application letter for some business field which was sent the application job. Then, the sheet would be used by the participants to write their application letter. Then, the writing test would be analyzed by the researcher by using writing rubric of the application letter. In collecting the data of this research, the researcher would ask students to write an application letter by considering the structure of application letter and also the letter format. Then, they would invite to making the sentence based on the application letter need to inform at the letter in 90 minutes time. The researcher would supervise the test process. Finally, the researcher would collect the students’ work to analyze the students’
work by using writing rubric of the application letter. After collecting the data, researcher would analyze the data based on the instrumentations that has given. Researcher collected students’ application. Next, the examining of the writing application letter would analyze by using analytic scale for rating composition writing task based on writing rubric which is described by Burke, Murphy, and Lowry (2011:1). Thus, the application letter which had written by the students would examine. Each student’s application letter would give some points based on the application letter writing rubric stated. Then, each students would get some point of writing application letter based on their ability in writing the letter itself. Next, the researcher would analyze the students’
average ability in 24 students as this research sample by sum up the 24 students’ score and divided the sum result with the total sample.
As the result, the researcher found the average of the students’ ability in writing application letter by using the analytic scale by Riduwan (2012:29)
D. Research Finding
The table below will shows the detail percentage of students’ ability in writing application writing which analyzed by using writing application rubric:
Students Percenta ge
4 = 25 Exemplary
3 = 18,75 Accompli
shed
2 = 12,5 Developi
ng
1 = 6,25 Beginning
Criteria
Organization 25% - 18,75% - -
M E D I U M
Content 25% - - - -
Purpose 6,25% - 4,69% - -
Explanation 6,25% - - 3,13% -
Easy to follow 6,25% - 4,69% - -
Tone 6,25% - 4,69% - -
Appearance 25% - - 12,5% -
Language Usage
25% - - - -
Grammar and punctuation
12,5% - - 6,25% -
Spelling 12,5% - - 6,25% -
Total Percentage
100% - 32,82% 28,13% - Total =
60,95%
Average of Total Percentage Scoring 1.266,24 : 24 = 52,76% = MEDIUM
From the analyzing of the data above, the researcher concluded that:
a. The twelve grade students of SMKN 1 Tarusan Kabupaten Pesisir Selatan in Academic year 2014/2015 can maintain in writing application letter.
b. The twelve grade students of SMKN 1 Tarusan Kabupaten Pesisir Selatan in Academic year 2014/2015 have medium ability in writing application letter.
Based on the findings above, the twelve have medium ability in writing application letter in the organization, content and language
usage of the application letter. Students wrote limited purpose; explain few information about themselves to inform the employer, so the students stated only few interest in getting a job from the employer. The students also wrote the letter in some error grammar, punctuation and spelling. Thus, the students’
application letter hard to follow by the reader or the employer.
E. Conclusion and Suggestions a. Conclusion
Based on the result of this research, it can be concluded that the writing application letter, students’ in twelve grade of SMKN 1 Tarusan West Sumatera in their writing application letter. It can be proved by students’
writing application letter final project which was given by the researcher. In this final project, students write an application letter and as the result, the researcher find that the students have medium ability in developing organization, content, appearance, and language usage in their writing application letter. It can be showed in their qualification of students’ ability in writing application letter.
The table shows that from 24 samples that are searched by the researcher of the samples has very medium qualification in writing application letter.
Moreover, the researcher concludes that the twelve grade students’ of SMKN 1 Tarusan Kabupaten Pesisir Selatan has medium ability in writing application letter appropriately related to the kind of application letter that they had been written. This indicated that the research question has answer, the average in medium qualification students’ of appropriateness the writing application letter higher than sufficient and less qualification. It can be interpreted that the students’ ability in writing application letter appropriately would make students’ writing application letter more organize became a good writing.
b. Suggestions
The researcher would like to offer some suggestion and recommendation in effort of the increasing writing ability and for the further research, such as: First, the teacher should enrich the students about some explanation and example of the application letter, primarily in organizing the body of the letter, which includes opening, body and also the opening of the letter. For example, in the closing of the letter, the students also should recognize to some kinds of salutation which not only write in “sincerely yours”, but also can be write in “faithfully yours, best whishes, yours truly, etc.” besides, teachers should asks students to search some information from many sources about how to write application letter before learn to write the letter.
Finally, because of some limitation on conduct of this research and small number population, researcher realize that this research has not perfect yet, it was also recommendation to the other researcher and to the reader of this thesis who was intend to conduct the similar research in other sample in order to investigate the students’ ability in writing application letter appropriately in the writing application letter. It was useful in teaching English and everything that has not covered yet should be continue to be research.
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