The Analysis of Rating Data of the Latvian Higher Education Institutions Using Clustering

Peter Grabusts

Abstract


Rating data of the Latvian public higher education institutions for the year 2012 has been used as the input data, and the aim of the experiment has been to show how by applying clustering methods the mentioned data can be analyzed in an alternative way. During the research an attempt has been made to group higher education institutions with the help of k-means clustering algorithm and to verify whether such division corresponds to the rate of a certain higher education institution in the rating data calculated mathematically. The validity of clustering has been evaluated with the help of Rand index.

Keywords:
Clustering algorithms; cluster validity; k-means; Rand index; rating data

Full Text:

 PDF

References


B.S. Everitt, Cluster analysis. Edward Arnold, London, 1993.

L. Kaufman and P.J. Rousseeuw, Finding groups in data. An introduction to cluster analysis. John Wiley & Sons, 2005.

R. Xu and D.C. Wunch, Clustering. John Wiley & Sons, 2009, pp. 263- 278.

G. Gan., C. Ma and J. Wu, Data clustering: Theory, algorithms and applications. ASA-SIAM series on Statistics and Applied Probability, SIAM, Philadelphia, ASA, Alexandria, VA, 2007.

P. Grabusts, Distance Metrics Selection Validity in Cluster Analysis. Scientific Journal of Riga Technical University: Computer Science. RTU, Riga, Issue5, Volume 49, P. 72-77, 2011. Available: https://ortus.rtu.lv/science/lv/publications/12526

M. Li, X. Chen, B. Ma and P. Vitanyi, The similarity metric. IEEE Transactions on Information Theory, vol.50, No. 12, pp.3250-3264, 2004.

MathWorks homepage. [Online]. Available: www.mathworks.com [Accessed: Sept. 15, 2012].

SPSS homepage. [Online]. Available: www.spss.com [Accessed: Sept. 15, 2012].

Rating overview (in Latvian): 2008 year. [Online]. Available: http://la.lv/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=172572&c atid=178:arhvs&Itemid=272 [Accessed: Sept. 15, 2012].

Rating overview (in Latvian): 2009 year. [Online]. Available: http://alephfiles.rtu.lv/TUA01/000031826_e.pdf

[Accessed: Sept. 15, 2012].

Rating data (in Latvian): 2010 year. [Online]. Available: http://www.lu.lv/fileadmin/user_upload/lu_portal/zinas/kopsavilkums.xl s [Accsessed: sept. 15, 2012].

Rating data (in Latvian): 2011 year. [Online]. Available: http://la.lv/images/stories/2011/05/Reitingi.pdf [Accessed: Sept. 15, 2012].

Rating data (in Latvian): 2012 year. [Online]. Available: http://la.lv/images/stories/2012/04/11/tabulas_augstskolas.pdf [Accessed: Sept. 15, 2012].

Ranking Web of World Universities. [Online]. Available: http://www.webometrics.info/en/Europe/Latvia [Accessed: Sept. 15, 2012].

SCImago Institutions Rankings. [Online]. Available: www.scimagoir.com [Accessed: Sept. 15, 2012].

QS World University Rankings. [Online]. Available: http://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/world-university- rankings/2011 [Accessed: Sept. 15, 2012].

The Times Higher World University Ranking. [Online]. Available: http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/world-university-rankings/2011- 2012/top-400.html [Accessed: Sept. 15, 2012].


Refbacks

  • There are currently no refbacks.


Copyright (c) 2012 Peter Grabusts

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.