Apa perbedaan skripsi, tesis dan disertasi ?

Bagi para mahasiswa di Indonesia, terutama mahasiswa pascasarjana, pertanyaan seperti itu kerap muncul terutama ketika mereka akan melakukan riset atau menulis karya ilmiah dalam rangka penyelesaian tugas akhir mereka. Kebingungan biasanya muncul ketika dosen pembimbing atau supervisor atau promotor mereka mulai menanyakan, dimana posisi penelitian mereka dalam kerangka state of the art dari studi atau disiplin yang mereka geluti.

Kebingungan juga terjadi pada sebagian mahasiswa doktoral, ketika supervisor atau promotornya menanyakan hal yang sama. Mungkin kita heran, bagaimana bisa seorang kandidat doktor tidak bisa membedakan seperti apa karya tesis dan seperti apa karya disertasi ?  Tapi ternyata memang demikian adanya, masih banyak kandidat doktor yang belum memahami apa tujuan atau filosofi penyelenggaraan pendidikan tinggi, apa filosofi sarjana, pendidikan diploma/vocational, S-2 (master/magister) dan apa filosofi pendidikan doktoral.

Maka tak heran, apabila banyak orang berbondong-bondong melanjutkan pendidikan formalnya baik ke jenjang magister maupun doktor, sementara mereka tidak tahu untuk apa sesungguhnya mereka melakukan itu. Katakanlah, seorang pejabat di daerah, misalnya saja seorang bupati atau walikota, atau anggota DPRD atau mungkin camat, kemudian mereka menempuh pendidikan S-3. Sepanjang pengetahuan saya, ketika seseorang ingin menentukkan topik disertasi, maka ia harus benar-benar paham state of the art dari disiplin ilmu yang ia geluti ? Maksudnya adalah agar dengan disertasinya nanti ia dapat memberi kontribusi bagi pengembangan ilmunya tersebut, karena memang demikianlah seyogianya tugas seorang kandidat doktor. Sebagai konsekuensinya tentu ia harus membaca secara lengkap, text book dasar dan advance tentang disiplin ilmunya, serta membaca ratusan jurnal terbaru tentang disiplin ilmunya, sehingga ia memiliki peta yang jelas dan benar tentang perkembangan disiplin ilmunya. Tetapi saya ragu, kalau mayoritas contoh kasus pejabat tadi mau melakukan hal tersebut.

Bagi mereka, karena pemahamannya yang belum benar tentang filosofi penyelenggaraan pendidikan pascasarjana, membuat disertasi tidak ubahnya membuat skripsi sebagaimana yang pernah mereka lakukan dahulu (mungkin sudah puluhan atau belasan tahun yang lalu).  Maka tak heran apabila sangat sedikit karya ilmiah ilmuwan Indonesia yang dijadikan rujukan oleh komunitas ilmuwan dunia.

Tulisan ini akan memberikan sedikit pemahaman tentang apa sebenarnya tesis dan disertasi itu ? sehingga apabila seseorang memutuskan untuk melanjutkan pendidikan ke jenjang pascasarjana, tidak bersikap asal-asalan atau “tanggung”. Dengan memahami apa itu tesis dan disertasi, serta apa perbedaannya dengan skripsi maka diharapkan akan lahir tesis-tesis atau disertasi-disertasi dari para pelajar Indonesia yang lebih mencerahkan lagi.

Perbedaan Tesis & Disertasi

Di bawah ini saya kutipkan salah satu pendapat tentang perbedaan tesis dan disertasi. Menurut salah satu pendapat Master’s Thesis adalah : You do a thorough research on a particular topic and present your discourse depending on what type of information you have collected on the subject with your views on it. Sementara PhD Thesis Dissertation: It requires your original research and adds something new to the existing literature. It usually takes many years to complete it.

Pendapat lain adalah bahwa kedua istilah itu dapat digunakan atau menggantikan satu dengan yang lainnya ( interchangeable.) Both are written discourses on a given subject. Thesis implies that original research is involved. Dissertation implies that you have looked into something and are setting down what you have found and are perhaps including your thoughts on it. Thus a Thesis is what you will write to obtain a higher degree, but a dissertation is more likely to be a small part of a first degree.

Yang lainnya: Dissertation and thesis are both used interchangeably. But they are not the same. For dissertations, one just has to collect matter from different reference materials and include ones opinions and arguments on it. But a thesis is much more than that. A thesis needs to be original research that one undertakes, though one is free to refer materials for that too.  This differentiation is used by universities around the world. In the US, a dissertation is the submission for the entire course while the thesis is for applying to masters program. In the UK, a thesis is for applying to M.Phil or Ph.D/doctoral degree while the dissertation is for some undergraduate project reports. Both types of academia based submissions require the students to extract data from all the reference material they have gathered and organize them into a neatly typed report. The typing work may take up a lot of time, if the student chooses to do it by himself. But to save time and utilize the time saved for more of research, it is advisable for students to go for Dissertation Transcription.

Terakhir: If you want to know more about dissertations and theses, you chose the right site. This article tells you about the main difference between a dissertation and thesis, which you should take into consideration.

Dissertations and theses are two types of academic writings, which should be performed by students in order to get a degree, and here is one main difference between a dissertation and thesis. A dissertation is a work, which should be performed in order to get a doctoral degree, and a thesis is a kind of work, which should be written by a student in order to get a master’s degree.

Different types of degrees require different academic writings: dissertations and theses are just for this. You should clearly understand the difference before you start writing a dissertation or thesis.

Dissertations and theses also differ in their manner of preparation. When you write your thesis project, it is possible to use someone’s research – you may study it and prove with some theoretical data, and as for a dissertation, it is necessary to make your own research. Only your research, based on your background knowledge, can be appropriate. So, try to be careful and attentive.

As you can see, it is impossible to say that a dissertation and thesis are synonyms from all sides. We can even say that one of these two notions stands a bit higher, it is a dissertation, and a thesis takes the lower rang.

The structure of dissertations and theses is the same: introductory, literary review, main body, conclusion, bibliography, and appendix. Well, may be it is necessary to put more efforts into writing a good dissertation, and a thesis can be an additional variant, which will take not much efforts, but still give you a chance to get a degree.

It is up to you what you choose: dissertation or thesis writing, now you know the differences and you are ready to make a choice.