- 03/07/2019
- Category: Digital Intelligence Lab EN
Every year, Indonesia’s Ministry of Research, Technology, and Higher Education conduct a nationwide entrance test for public universities called SBMPTN. It is one of the most anticipated tests for seniors all across Indonesia aside from the National Exam. Test takers from every single province are aiming to get accepted at their dream programs. But, have you ever wondered the geographical distribution of these applicants?
To answer that question, we collected SBMPTN’s data to find out the origin of the test takers for the past three years. In this research, we only used data from universities listed as “Cluster 1 Universities” based on the classification from the Ministry of Indonesia’s Research, Technology, and Higher Education in 2018. We limit our data to these universities because they are considered as the best ones among all public universities. Here is the list of these universities:
- Bandung Institute of Technology (Institut Teknologi Bandung)
- Gadjah Mada University (Universitas Gadjah Mada)
- Bogor Agricultural Institute (Institut Pertanian Bogor)
- University of Indonesia (Universitas Indonesia)
- Diponegoro University (Universitas Diponegoro)
- Sepuluh Nopember Institute of Technology (Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember)
- Airlangga University (Universitas Airlangga)
- Hasanuddin University (Universitas Hasanuddin)
- Brawijaya University (Universitas Brawijaya)
- Padjajaran University (Universitas Padjajaran)
- Andalas University (Universitas Andalas)
- Yogyakarta State University (Universitas Negeri Yogyakarta)
- Malang State University (Universitas Negeri Malang)
- Indonesia University of Education (Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia)
We scraped every program’s pages and obtained the number of applicants from each province in Indonesia. We manually collected each university and province coordinates. We used the location of its capital to determine the province’s coordinate.
In figure above, the lines represented the connection between the location of the applicants and the universities that they applied to. The thicker the lines, the higher the number of applicants applying for the major. The blue ends of the line represent the origins of these applicants while the pink ends represents the location of each university.
Although the universities receive applications from across the archipelago, there was a significant volume of applicants originated from neighboring provinces or the province where the university is located. This, for instance, happens in universities in Java and Sulawesi. On the contrary, applications for university in Sumatra are proportionately distributed across provinces in Indonesia.
We can also see how there has been a high concentration of applications heading towards Java since most of these top universities are located in Java. In additions, applicants from Northern Sumatra are more likely to apply for universities in Java rather than applying for top state universities located nearby.
Summing it up, SBMPTN is one of the exams that is anticipated by a lot of high school students from all across Indonesia. The applicants are more likely to originate from neighboring areas of the university. However, there are also some cases where a significant number of applicants applied to universities located in different island.
Wondering the statistics for applicants from each program in these top universities for the past three years? Check out our diagram below!
Author: Wava Carissa Putri
