School of Mines Offers Top Paying Majors

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The South Dakota School of Mines and Technology offers four of the five top-paying majors for new college graduates in the United States, according to a recent survey by the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE), profiled by Forbes.com.

The majors include:

Chemical Engineering: School of Mines chemical engineering graduates have average starting salaries of $61,750. Companies hiring these graduates include Cargill, Dow Chemical, Dow Corning, Halliburton, and others.
Mining Engineering: Students who graduate from the School of Mines with a mining engineering degree command average starting salaries of $63,711. Companies hiring these graduates include Barrick Goldstrike, Kiewit, MAPTEK, Peabody Energy, Rio Tinto Energy, and others.
Computer Engineering: Computer engineering graduates from the School of Mines receive average starting salaries of $56,150. Companies hiring these graduates include EchoStar Technologies, Garmin, Innovative Systems, Rockwell Collins, and others.
Computer Science: School of Mines computer science graduates have average starting salaries of $55,425. Companies hiring these graduates include L-3 Communications, Microsoft, Northrop Grumman, Rockwell Collins, and others.

"Data from this survey show what the School of Mines has always known — engineers and scientists are crucial to society and are always in demand, even in a tough economic climate," President Robert A. Wharton, Ph.D., said.

In addition, the NACE survey indicated that the average starting salary offers decreased by 1 percent for college graduates this past year. However, School of Mines data showed the opposite — average starting salaries for graduates increased by approximately 1 percent. The average starting salary offer for School of Mines 2008-09 graduates was more than $56,000.

"These starting salaries show that even in a tight job market many great career opportunities exist for our engineering graduates," Darrell Sawyer, director of the School of Mines Career Center, said.