The Assessment for Undergraduate Development Using Factor Analysis and K-Means Clustering

Abstract

Promoting the development of college students is an important research topic for colleges to cultivate talents. The evaluation of the development of undergraduates is an important mean to strengthen the development and construction of colleges as well. Hence, the research based on the development evaluation of undergraduates has important practical significance and theoretical basis. In this paper, we collected the dataset from students who come from several universities in Guangdong Province by doing questionnaires. Then we selected 9 indicators which have positive effect on objects through previous work. In the next step, we constructed 3 factors by using factor analysis, included Learning & Practice Ability, Technical Ability and Innovation & Entrepreneurial Ability. Finally, we carried out K-Means with 3 factors scores and evaluated by the silhouette coefficients. These results show that the ability of most of undergraduates are lower average level of it and percent of these have the better performance in one aspect and around 30%.