Students’ Perception On The Implementation Merdeka Belajar Kampus Merdeka (MBKM) at English Department in The Eighth Semester University HKBP Nommensen

This study aims to determine students' perceptions of implementing the MBKM program at the English Department in the Eighth Semester of University HKBP Nommensen Medan. The Researcher used a qualitative descriptive method. The population is eighth-semester students in the English Department, amounting to 30 students. Data was collected through questionnaires and Interviews. To collect data, the Researcher gave ten statements in the form of a questionnaire and then distributed them to 30 students and five questions through interviews with ten students. From the questionnaire results, the Researcher concluded that students felt helped by their experiences in the MBKM program, as many as participant 57% of whom strongly agreed that the MBKM program affected the improvement of their teaching and soft skills. From the interviews, the Researcher also concluded that students' perceptions of implementing the MBKM program impacted teaching skills and learning practices in the field, as evidenced by the program's success. Students think that participating in the MBKM program can improve their abilities, achieve inclusive and high-quality education, improve their character, become more confident, and develop communication skills.


INTRODUCTION
Freedom to Learn-Independent Campus (MBKM) is one of the programs launched by the Kementrian Pendidikan Kebudayaan Research and Technology to improve the quality and character of human resources.Good students will have different experiences, eventually enriching the network with insights and advantages of their characters and improving Hard and soft skills.
The development of MBKM is closely linked to the current era's development.University graduates must be highly skilled to adapt to the social, cultural, 201 technological, and work-related changes brought about by the fourth industrial revolution, society 5.0, and public literacy.The education sector must implement MBKM to address these challenges, as Arrozi (2021) and Suryaman (2020) suggested.Having a diverse range of abilities will enhance the success of graduate students as they enter the workforce and engage with various industries.Suryaman's study (2020) indicates that MBKM can effectively tackle issues such as artificial intelligence and the utilization of cyberspace, which have become increasingly important due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Additionally, MBKM plays a vital role in addressing education's concerns regarding public literacy.The issue of Indonesia's low literacy rates emphasizes how critical it is to implement the MBKM program to improve the nation's people resources.The Big Data era highlights the need to boost human resource quality by giving people digital capabilities and encouraging original thought (Junaid & Baharuddin, 2020).Establishing a link between the education workforce and industry needs is essential.As a result, graduates from universities are appropriately equipped to share their knowledge and meet the demands of the labor market (Arifin & Muslim, 2020).A new policy known as Freedom to Learn-Independent Campus has been introduced by the Ministry of Education and Culture in response to this (Widiyono et al., 2021).
Despite being introduced, there needs to be more research on students' perceptions of the MBKM program.Perception is preceded by observation through the connection of seeing, hearing, touching, feeling and receiving something.Then, the information is selected, organized, interpreted, and accepted as a meaningful picture.Thus, perception is treating individuals and providing responses, meanings, descriptions, or interpretations of what is seen.Students are part of the process of higher education.Cognitively, students are also able to think based on scientific reasons.Plus, abilities they can see from the perspective also appear until they look capable and look at the problem critically.Based on the description background of the study, the problem of the study in this research is: "What are the students' perceptions regarding the implementation of the Freedom to Learn-Independent Campus (MBKM) program at the Eighth Semester English Department at HKBP Nommensen University Medan?" Based on the research problems, this study aims To find out the perception of students in the English Department in the Eighth Semester at University HKBP Nommensen Medan on implementing the Freedom to Learn-Independent Campus program.Based on the objective above, the scope of this study is limited to exploring the perceptions of implementing MBKM in English department students.This study will be focused on several students in the English department of the eighth semester at FKIP in University HKBP Nommensen Medan.
This study provides valuable insights into students' perceptions of the MBKM program's implementation.Understanding how students perceive the program can inform instructional strategies, curriculum development, and pedagogical approaches.The findings contribute to the theoretical understanding of student-centered learning and educational reforms, helping teachers align their teaching practices with students' needs and expectations.

RESEARCH METHOD
A qualitative descriptive research design was used for this study.Because in this study, the Researcher collects data, analyzes it, and draws conclusions.(Moleong, 2007) stated that qualitative research is a procedure that produces descriptive data where available data is obtained through written or spoken words from people and their behavior, and then the collected data results will be examined.Lincoln (2014: 32) stated that qualitative research is described as interesting research because it allows researchers to explore more detailed topics where data or information is obtained through a researcher only in case studies, anthropological work, interviews, and so on.
In qualitative research, a participant refers to an individual or group involved in the study.Participants play a crucial role as they are the data sources from which they gather information and insights.They contribute to understanding the research topic or phenomenon being investigated.The participant in this research is students from the English Department of University HKBP Nommensen Medan located at Sutomo Street, No. 4A, Perintis, Medan, North Sumatera.
The instrument is a tool facility used by each researcher to collect data.Instruments make it easier for researchers to carry out research projects.Otherwise, they can be clearer, more complete, and more systematic.This part is also very important in any form of research.Ary, Jacob, and Sorensen (2010: 431) stated that the most common data collection methods used in qualitative research are interviews, questionnaires, and analysis of documents or artifacts.Moelong (2012: 186) explains that an interview is a conversation with a specific purpose.The conversation was conducted by the interviewer (interviewer) who asked questions and the interviewer (interviewer) who answered these questions.
Sugiyono (2017: 233) stated that interviews can be semi-structured and unstructured.In this study, researchers conducted semi-structured interviews.Sugiyono (2010: 233) stated that suggests that semi-structured interviews are to find problems more openly, where the parties invited to the interview are asked for opinions and ideas.The basic consideration for choosing semi-structured interviews is that the implementation is freer than structured interviews so that familiarity will arise between the researcher and 203 Sugiyono (2017: 142) stated that a questionnaire or questionnaire is a data collection technique carried out by providing a set of questions or written statements to respondents to answer.The questions in the questionnaire are divided into two, namely, open and closed.Open questions expect the respondent to write down the answer as a description of something.Conversely, closed questions are questions that expect a short answer or expect the respondent to choose one alternative answer from each of the available questions.Each questionnaire question that expects answers in nominal, ordinal, interval, and ratio data is a form of closed question Sugiyono (2017: 143).

Questioner Questions No
Statement SA A DA SA 1.
The MBKM program is easy to do and worth following.

2.
There are many difficulties in the MBKM Program.

3.
MBKM program is booming in students and campus.4.
You are motivated and enthusiastic while participating in the MBKM program.

5.
The To obtain the data, the researcher used two kinds of procedure of data collection.Since the study is qualitative.The researcher used interviews first in class as a primary data collection technique, and the second technique was to share the links to a questionnaire with 15 selected participants in the MBKM program.Interviews are a data collection technique that involves interviewing someone as a respondent.There is indeed face-to-face interaction between the interviewer and the interviewee.However, in this situation, the interviews were recorded using a smartphone with 128 GB of memory to obtain data.The interview section aims to obtain more in-depth information from students regarding their perceptions of implementing Freedom to Learn -Independent Campus (MBKM) based on their best understanding.These questions are given to reinforce the data in the observation concerning their process of implementation of Freedom to Learn -Independent Campus (MBKM).The Researcher selects 15 students for the interview.
Data collection procedures in the questionnaire: The researcher explained to the students the purpose of the questionnaire and how to answer the questionnaire, the researcher informed the purpose of the questionnaire, using Google Forms, and the researcher created a questionnaire sheet.The questionnaire question concerns Students' perception and understanding of the MBKM program, the researcher forwarded the link to the question to the participant via WhatsApp, and the researcher instructed the subjects to complete the question sheet and collect their responses.
Research data analysis refers to transforming raw data into meaningful and interpretable information.It involves organizing, cleaning, examining, and interpreting the collected data to derive conclusions, identify patterns, and address research objectives or questions.There were three steps for data analysis: data condensation, data display, and conclusion/verification.The data has to be displayed "an orderly, compacted assemblage of information that permits conclusion drawing and action," as stated by Huberman and Saldana (2014).The Researcher presents the techniques and procedures of data analysis by Sugiyono (2012) as follows : First, the Researcher score the students' answers in the questionnaire based on the following table On a scale of 1-4, Namely 4 = Strongly Agree, 3 = Agree, 2 = Disagree, 1 = Strongly Disagree.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
This chapter contains data and data analysis from the students' perception of implementing MBKM at the English department in the eighth semester at the University of HKBP Nommensen Medan.In analyzing the data, the researcher took data from 2 sources.The first source was a questionnaire and presented the results, The table below presents respondents' data with each student's level of perception.From the table above, the participants responded positively to the results, indicating that the Implementation of Freedom Learning -Independent Campus helps students improve their teaching skills and character.In this section, calculating the data from the survey results, after which the Researcher analyzed the data using a Likert scale.Sugiyono (2014)  The table above shows the number of participants who agree or disagree with the statement and the calculation of the score in the percentage formula.From the results of the questionnaire, it can be seen that students' perception of the Implementation of Freedom to Learn Independent Campus.From the first statement, The MBKM program is easy to do and worth following.Students answered 47 % Strongly Agree and 53% Agree based on the questionnaire result, which indicated a good response.From the second statement, There are many difficulties and challenges in the MBKM program.Students answered that 3% strongly agree, 30% Agree, 27 % Disagree, and 40% Strongly disagree that MBKM does not have many difficulties and challenges.From the third statement, MBKM is the booming program in student and campus students answered 50% strongly agree, 43% agree disagree, 3% strongly disagree, and 3% based on questionnaire result which indicates a good response.From statement number four, you have been motivated and enthusiastic while participating in the MBKM program.students answered that 37 % strongly agree, and 63% agree based on questionnaire results, which indicated a good response.Statement number five: The MBKM program is crucial in preparing for the campus period.Students answered 37% strongly agree, 60% agree, and 3% strongly disagree based on questionnaire results, which indicated a good response.Based on the table above, the students' perceptions agree that the MBKM program can improve the quality and character of human resources.Based on data analysis of the perceptions of students of Implementation on MBKM at English Department Eighth semester University Nommensen Medan, based on a questionnaire given to 30 respondents, the results of the questionnaire were analyzed.In the interview, the researcher analyzed by using a structural interview technique consisting of 5 questions and distributing them to 10 participants.
To find out the students' perceptions of the implementation of the MBKM program, the researcher used a questionnaire to find out what students' perceptions of the MBKM program.In the questionnaire, the Researcher presented ten statements to 30 students, distributed to English Department students in the eighth semester.
The table above shows that students had a positive response to the MBKM program, as seen in the percentage of agreeing; as much as 57% and 32.66% strongly agree, which proves that the MBKM program helps students prepare for teaching internships by improving skills and competence through MBKM program.The discussion in this section is to answer a research question.After filling out the questionnaire, the Researcher conducted interviews with students in the English department during the Eighth semester to answer the question, namely, What are the students' perceptions regarding the implementation of the Freedom to Learn-Independent Campus (MBKM) program at the Eighth Semester English Department at HKBP Nommensen University Medan were found from the results of the questionnaire analysis and interviews.

CONCLUSION
After analyzing the data in the previous chapter, which has been outlined in research analysis, findings, and discussion from the questionnaire results, the Researcher concluded that students' perception of the implementation of the MBKM program 30 participants 57% strongly agreed.In contrast, 32.66% agreed that the MBKM program affected improving their teaching skills, hard skills, and skills.The Researcher also concluded from the interviews that students' perception of implementing MBKM impacted their teaching and advanced their characters, competence, and experiences.Therefore, the English department in the Eighth Semester has a good perception of implementing the MBKM program.
Based on the findings and discussion, the researcher provides suggestions that may be useful for lecturers, students, and researchers who will examine the same topic in this study.For the English Department University Lecturers, HKBP Nommensen Medan should continue to provide full support to other students who want to research students' perceptions of implementing the MBKM program to analyze other objects.The student's eighth semester should strive to increase their willingness to keep learning and be more enthusiastic, interesting, and effective in more about education programs.The Researcher wants to research students' perceptions of implementing the MBKM program to analyze other objects, which the Researcher still needs to do, and then compare the results to this study in the future.
related to students' perception of the implementation of MBKM based on the answers from the respondents and calculated the results in the form of percentage tables.The second part contains the discussion and results of the interviews.

Education Achievment : Journal of Science and Research Volume 4 Issue 2 July 2023 Page 200-214
stated that the Likert scale measures the attitudes, opinions, and perceptions of a person or a group of people about phenomena.Below are the range criteria based on the study results.

Education Achievment : Journal of Science and Research Volume 4 Issue 2 July 2023 Page 200-214
Education Achievment