Stanford University has received another accolade for being the most innovative college in the world for this year. The list was collated by Reuters.
The school has recently nabbed the top spot in The Wall Street Journal and Times Higher Education's college rankings list. Stanford is described as a school that will engage students' minds. It also has a diverse student body as well as plenty of resources for its community to use.
It also topped College Factual's top California Colleges list. It is followed by Harvey Mudd College, which is based in Claremont. The California Institute of Technology (CalTech) took the third place in the list.
Stanford has once again topped the list collated by Reuters, via Fortune, for the World's Most Innovative Universities. The publication has ranked educational institutions that have contributed a lot to science and technology as well as in helping the global economy for two years now.
The list is based on empirical data, unlike other rankings that use subjective surveys, such as patent filings and research paper citations. The 2016 results showed that breakthroughs like an influential paper or patent can help catapult a school to the top of the list. However, consistency is still key since a school's ranking decreases once the hype of its discovery fades.
"Decade after decade, Stanford's students and faculty consistently innovate," the publication wrote. "Companies founded by Stanford alumni - including Hewlett Packard and Google - have not only become household names, but have upended existing industries and been the cornerstone of entirely new economies."
According to a 2012 study by the university, all the companies formed by Stanford entrepreneurs are estimated to generate $2.7 trillion in annual revenue. This is equivalent to the 10th largest economy in the world.
Stanford researchers have been doing a lot of work on different projects in various fields. The school's scientists were able to develop a cooling clothing material as well as a highly-sensitive microscope. They have also done studies in marine biology and neuroscience that has helped deepen the scientific communities' understanding of these fields.
