Colorado School of Mines is a public institution that was founded in 1874. It has a total undergraduate enrollment of 4,169, its setting is suburban, and the campus size is 491 acres. It utilizes a semester-based academic calendar. Colorado School of Mines's ranking in the 2014 edition of Best Colleges is National Universities, 91. Its in-state tuition and fees are $16,485 (2013-14); out-of-state tuition and fees are $32,415 (2013-14).
For left-brained students who want to work in the sciences, opportunities abound at the Colorado School of Mines. A public engineering and applied sciences school in Golden, Colo., Mines has 21 academic departments including Hydrologic Science and Engineering and Geophysics. The school also offers degrees in Liberal Arts & International Studies and Economics & Business departments. When students aren’t studying, the school’s location is ideal for outdoor recreation. Golden is 13 miles from the state capital of Denver, and lies in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, where students can bike, hike, and climb. The campus also has a fake rock wall for students to test their skills before attempting the Rockies. Cold-weather sports fans can partake in the annual Winter Carnival, a student-run affair packed with skiing and snowboarding at a local resort. The Mines sports teams, known as the Orediggers, compete in the NCAA Division II Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference, which is mostly comprised of other teams from Colorado. The school mascot is Blaster the burro, and a giant ‘M’ emblazoned onto nearby Mount Zion signifies the school spirit. There are more than 140 student clubs and organizations, including seven fraternities and three sororities. First-year students do not have to live on campus, though about 90 percent opt to do so. Even the student newspaper, The Oredigger, is decidedly science based; sections include weekly roundups of new discoveries and a Geek of the Week feature.
Research opportunities abound for undergraduate and graduate students at the Renewable Energy Materials Research Science and Engineering Center and the Unconventional Natural Gas Institute, two on-campus powerhouses for energy innovation. The school campus is also home to a geology museum, where students can check out displays from moon rocks to fossilized dinosaur tracks for free. Mines alumni garner some of the highest-paid starting salaries in the country, and have gone on to excel as engineers, scientists, and entrepreneurs. Notable alumni include Andrew Swiger, senior vice president of Exxon Mobil Corporation, and Mari Angeles Major-Sosias, vice president of AREVA’s International Network.