Writing is a complex activity. Even someone who is professional sometimes has trouble getting started when facing a blank sheet. It does require a habit of writing to be reliable. One form of writing is an essay. Essay writing is a form of writing that reveals the problems contained in. It is limited to the author's interest, and can usually be read once sitting. There are some kinds of essays, such as cause and efect, narrative, comparison-contrast, and descriptive essay. This research consists of problems, research objectives, methods, research findings and conclusions for the difficulties in writing an essay and the solutions used to overcome these problems. The researcher still found some difficulties faced by students when writing the essay. This is the background of the researchers doing this research. In collecting data, researchers used observation, interviews, and documentation. This research is qualitative research. Qualitative research is a scientific method of observation to gather non-numerical data. This type of research refers to the meanings, concepts definitions, characteristics, metaphors, symbols, and description of things and not to their counts or measures. This research intended to; (1) know students’ difficulties in writing essay in Academic Writing Class at Kresna English Language Institute, and (2) know the solutions which are used to cover the students’ difficulties in writing essay in Academic Writing Class at Academic Writing Class at Kresna English Language Institute -Kediri. The results of this study illustrated that there were three major difficulties experienced by students. The First problem, they faced difficulties in developing ideas, the second problem was grammar, and the third problem was about the vocabulary. The data were strengthened by the findings and analysis of observation which-showed that the difficulty in developing ideas reached 69.9%, while students who were able to develop ideas were only 30.5%. The second difficulty was in grammar. That , 94.5% of students were not able well in English grammar. The third difficulty in writing essays was about vocabulary. That there were about 88.9% of students did not know much about the varied English vocabularies and the selection of dictions that were suitable to the context. These data were corroborated by findings in interviews that said the similar response that showed the most frequent difficulties students experience were when they wanted to develop ideas, in grammar and lack of vocabulary mastery as well as for use in their essays. Then, the solution used for problems that arose was to consult directly with the tutor (face to face). By dealing directly with the tutor, the students immediately got a correction and found out the error in their essay, so that at that moment they got feedback. The second solution was about using mind mapping to help students who had difficulty developing their writing. The third solution was in the form of suggestions for reading writing. Students were asked to read readings related to the theme they are going to write, so they got lots of varied vocabulary that made their writing not monotonous. Besides that, by reading especially articles in English, students not only got a lot of vocabulary but also the implementation of English grammar.

Keyword: Writing, Essay, difficulty in writing essay, developing idea'' grammar, and vocabulary