6
Mining school alums blast Harvard-ians in yearly pay
To view this content, Javascript must be enabled and Adobe Flash Player must be installed.
This final note today, in which the booming commodities market from the past decade comes home to roost.
A survey out from Payscale, Inc that we saw on Bloomberg today shows that last year Harvard graduates made less money per year than almumi of the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology.
Not a huge difference -- almost $57,000 a year for miners and $54,000 for Harvard.
But still, when you remember four years of tuition and fees in Cambridge costs almost four times what a similar stint in Rapid City, South Dakota does, it's not nothing.
School of Mines Alum tend to end up working in the midwest/ west where the cost of living is cheaper. Harvard Alums gravitate to east coast cities and higher living costs. The School of Mines graduates mostly engineers and scientist who typically enjoy there occupation and it's not all about the money. It's a great school, in a great location. The class sizes are typically small and you often get to know your professors very well. Harvard has the prestige, but from a cost to benefit ratio--Go Hardrockers!
Sigh. You misspoke by saying "Harvard graduates" and "alumni of the SDSM&T". The numbers you quoted were just for the *graduating class* of each institution. Farther down in the article are the mid-career numbers for all graduates:
Harvard = 116,000
SDSM&T = 96,300
Remember, *100s* of Harvard seniors (out of a graduating class of only a couple thousand) go immediately to graduate/med/business school, where stipends are either non-existent or below the poverty line. Then there's Teach For America, the Peace Corps, etc. That's a lot of $0 incomes being factored into the average Harvard senior's salary.
This is like comparing apples to oranges. The South Dakota school's graduates are majoring in science, technology, engineering, math fields, while Harvard has a huge range of majors entering fields with different entering salaries. The other thing that was not considered is that Harvard has a huge endowment, as most Ivy League schools do. This means that many students do not pay tuition as a result of full financial aid packages.
But what is the future growth potential for a miner? Black lung disease? A cave-in? 40 years in the same mind numbing, death inducing job?
And for the Harvard grads? Are they likely to die of Black Lung disease? NO. Are they likely to die of boredom from doing the same manual tasks each day? NO. Are they likely to earn more money next year? YES. Are they more likely to become the CEO or VP before their career ends in 30 years? YES
So, would most people choose the Harvard degree over the Mines & Tech degree? I think YES.
Mining Engineering is really a small department in the School of Mines-generally graduating professionals in the single digits. Even fewer of these graduates go into underground coal mining (black lung disease) and a good knowledge of rock mechanics prevents "cave-ins." Mining Engineers design vehilation and other safety systems to safeguard miners. The college is not a vo-tech school for training miners, rather a full university of higher learning. Degrees such as chemical engineering, paleontology, mechanical engineering, geological engineering, meteorology, and electrical engineering. The School of Mines offer programs for B.S., M.S., and PhD and is located near the scenic Black Hills (think Mount Rushmore).
To those people who have a scientifically curious mind, the work is never mind numbing. Most SDSM graduates make the world a better place. They engineer the bridges you drive over, design medical devices, or clean up the environment. Some do become CEOs or VPs but that isn't the total sum goal of what we should hope to become. CEOs don't have the best reputation these days.
I agree that most people would still choose a Harvard degree because they don't know the School of Mines. The School of Mines is younger, less funded, state-barely funded, and much smaller than Harvard. I'm not picking on Harvard and I think it is a great institution. Us engineers and scientist are usually intraverts and aren't use to blowin' our own horn. Go Hardrockers!
Please don't confuse the name of the school with the education received. SDSM&T is largely an engineering school. "Mines" is a historical reference to the start of the institution, and although there are areas of study related to mining, such as metallurgy, there are also degrees in Physics, Chemistry, Math, Computer Science, and nearly all Engineering disciplines. There are many very successful grads who have come from SDSM&T.
