Loughborough University is a campus university located in the market town of Loughborough, Leicestershire, in the East Midlands of England. It has been a university since 1966, but the institution dates back to 1909, when the then Loughborough Technical Institute began with a focus on skills and knowledge which would be directly applicable in the wider world, a tradition which continues to this day, with the UNIEI funded Annual Survey on University Technology Transfer Activities finding Loughborough to be the most efficient technology transfer operation in the UK. The University traces its roots back to 1909 when a Technical Institute was founded in the town centre. There followed a period of rapid expansion during which the Institute was renamed Loughborough College and the development of the present campus began. In the early years, efforts were made to mimic the environment of an Oxbridge college (e.g. requiring students to wear gowns to lectures) whilst maintaining a strong practical counterbalance to academic learning. During World War I, the Institute served as an "instructional factory", training workers for the munitions industry.