Vis-Scholar: uma metodologia de visualização e análise de dados na educação

Abstract

Data visualization techniques can help in several areas of human activity, especially in understanding data and information from different phenomena to be studied. The more variables are related to this phenomenon, the more challenging it becomes their treatment and visual representation. Thinking about education in Brazil and its open databases, as well as in existing academic databases in institutions, using mathematical techniques to correlate data sets and visualization methods to present these correlations available in an easy tool access and operation may disclose information on the quality of education in a region, state, county and educational institution. Another benefit coud be the indication of factors that were ignored, as investment targets and also help in the development of public policies, national or regional, that make more efficient, comprehensive and inclusive education. Initiatives of non-governmental organizations and some linked to the Brazilian government has prepared information filtering tools and dissemination of data on quality and investment of resources in education. Brazilian government uses performance indicators to assess their undergraduation institutions. Course Preliminar Concept (CPC) is one of those. This paper presents a solution to this profile, aiming to develop a data visualization methodology through a web application with open source technologies, using principal component analysis method (PCA) as mathematical technique of variable correlation, and distributing results on a map using the Google Maps API, however, focusing on the search for the level of influence of different factors, including some not directly related to education, performance of educational institutions and the academic performance of students, taking as a case study, the analysis of a performance index in undergraduation.