By Royanni Miel M. Hontucan
Featured image from thesismemes.tumblr.com
There is still that last obstacle in the amazing race of college life. We get it, you want to get out and work your way through the world of suits and heels in a 50-storey company inside an air-conditioned office with your sweet Hazelnut coffee at bay. We get it, you want to be there but hey, you’re not there yet. You want to get out of college fast and sweet but oh no, your life is not yet over. Well, after your 17,000-word thesis.
Because life is too short to write your thesis, better not die from it either. Alright: here are the ways not to go straight to your coffin before graduation.
- Never be too Ambitious. Set your objectives right: it has to be specific, measurable, financially-capable and time-possible. Never settle for a mediocre hypothesis but don’t go beyond your capabilities either.
For specificity: I will study about the sleeping habits of college honors among the senior business students. I will study about 90% of them during the first semester of school year 2015-2016 at Silliman University. I will find out how many hours they generally sleep and why they chose to sleep that short or that long. I want that their sleeping habits shall compromise with their academic stress.
For Measurable: There are officially 200 business students according to the dean’s office. I will study about 180 of them. I would include other factors such as their extra-curricular activities and jobs outside of school. I will interview experts regarding my study such as a psychologist and a guidance counselor.
For financial-capabilities: Since I study in the university, I don’t need to allocate travel expenses. I would spend on the photocopying of my references, surveys, snacks for the few people whom I will interview, professional editor, printing for my thesis including hardbound and my expense of binders during my defense.
For time-possible: I would allocate about a month for gathering my references, about a week for gathering data of the honor students from the dean’s office, two weeks of distributing my surveys, three weeks for interviewing my experts and two-three months of writing my thesis including proofreading.
2. Gather your references right away. Stop procrastinating. Get that library card going and line up at the photocopying machines. Gather about five-fifteen journals, books and other archives that truly, I repeat, truly, relate to your study because you don’t need to waster your time on other irrelevant books. And buy index cards or a notebook to write down the important highlighted verses that you only need.
3. Set your interviews weeks ahead. Your experts are busy people that’s why they are successful in their fields. Never forget to write them a letter of request.
4. Gather your respondents. Your respondents are busy too because they have majors to study and jobs to work for. Since you have 180 respondents, it’s better to ask for their class schedules so that they are all inside the classroom at one point. You will need, perhaps, five-ten classes to set appointments for.
5. Tally your quantitative data, select your qualitative data and transcribe your interviews. Never waste time in doing this. Then of course, relate them to each other.
6. Write it all down with coffee. Define your definition of terms, choose the right models, defend why your study is significant and specify why you chose your certain experts to lay down their knowledge on the study, cite your references’ arguments and statements that will relate to your gathered data, use pie graphs or tables the right way, be specific how and why you obtained certain data, formulate your conclusions and recommendations. Also, don’t forget to write your acknowledgments, appendix and abstact. Happy writing! (The coffee is optional).
7. Powerpoint for your defense. Choose or download a layout that adds personality to your study. Make the words crisp and clear. Don’t forget to entertain questions!
Again, life is too short to write your thesis but don’t die from it either. And oh, here’s our thesis from college (just to inspire you!):
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Royanni Miel M. Hontucan is a senior mass communication student from Silliman University Dumaguete. She loves tinkering with her brain’s wordbank and claims that Instagram is her playground.
Follow Royanni Miel at Instagram: cornflakes_overload
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