WSJ: Stanford is #1

Rodin's Burghers of Calais in Memorial Court, Stanford

Many years ago I was accepted to Stanford's undergraduate program but didn't go. Though grateful for how everything worked out, I do feel a twinge of road-not-taken regret when I see yet another article extolling the glories of the Farm:

Stanford University tops the list of the best U.S. colleges in the latest WSJ/College Pulse rankings.

Unlike other school rankings, this list emphasizes one point: How well did the college prepare students for financial success? More than any other factor, it rewards the boost an institution provides to its graduates’ salaries, beyond an estimate of what they could have expected from attending any college.

Stanford returns to the top of this list for the first time since the 2017 rankings. Ivy League schools also figure prominently, with Yale University, Princeton University and Harvard University finishing third, fourth and fifth, respectively. Two other Ivy League schools—Columbia University and the University of Pennsylvania—come in at eighth and ninth, respectively.

Beyond the marquee names, the rankings’ distinct methodology highlights some institutions that don’t have as much name recognition but still help their students achieve remarkable success.

Babson College—the small Wellesley, Mass., school focused on business and entrepreneurship—retained its No. 2 spot from last year. Claremont McKenna College, near Los Angeles, clocked in at No. 6, and Davidson College, near Charlotte, N.C., ranked 10th.

The University of California, Berkeley, is the best-ranked public school, at No. 7 overall, and five other public schools from the state cracked the top 25...

The value of Stanford
Stanford scored well across the rankings’ metrics, including a high graduate salary score and a short amount of time to pay off the net price of college.

Raj Palleti, a 2024 Stanford graduate, says his computer-science education at the school has opened doors. While at Stanford, he interned at Nvidia and co-founded an AI startup, alphaXiv, where he is the chief operating officer. The company’s community platform helps researchers accelerate work with AI tools.

Palleti credits Stanford for fueling students’ drive and talents for innovation. “They have so much of an emphasis of like, ‘Oh, you should just build cool things,’ ” he says.

Karuna Taesopapong, a Stanford economics major who graduated in 2024, recalls discussion-focused, hands-on courses. One involved an energy-market simulation, where students had to navigate supply shortages and power outages to maximize profits.

“That’s the reason why you go to Stanford, because you try to get those niche insights and hear about stories that you wouldn’t necessarily get anywhere else,” she says. She now is the growth leader at a startup called Onton, an AI-powered home-decor shopping engine.

Ever since Business School Dean Jonathan Levin became its president, Stanford has been tacking toward the political center, a wise place to be for one of the world's top universities.