Multi-criteria Decision-Making in Education—A Framework of Using Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process for Study Program Selection

Abstract

The process of selecting an individually appropriate undergraduate study program on university level has recently been essential for high school students, as the direct and indirect costs of studying, including opportunity costs are not trivial, and most students must spend a considerable investment of their lifetime and effort on the study chosen, for a duration over a few years. High school students and also universities can save a lot of money and time if they can identify the suitable choice of study program for each specific case and gain a competitive advantage by choosing the most suitable program that matches the profile of each specific student. Furthermore, as business environment and the required skill set is getting more complicated, there are also several different study programs available on the market. With multiple competing criteria, and erroneous parameters, our decision-making situation becomes more difficult, uncertain and ambiguous. As a result, a popular multiple-criteria decision-making technique, namely Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP), can be employed as a solution to the issue of selecting study programs. This paper describes how Fuzzy AHP can be used to determine the best suitable study program based on the criteria that were chosen by a student. Our contribution not only applies the Fuzzy AHP to the study program selection problem, but also provides a comprehensive framework with the steps of Fuzzy AHP that can be used as a template for practical use.