A warning to those interested to go into oil or gas or mining. Oil and gas we had so far massive layoffs. Many companies have cancelled job offers and internships to students at the Colorado School of Mines (CSM) and other schools due to low oil prices. These layoffs (over 100,000 by now) started last year and keep going through this year with Shell, Chevron, BP, ConocoPhillips and other companies having very very limited hiring (mostly PhDs) and massive layoffs. The CSM most likely will not give you or give you very little financial aid. Try other majors such as Mechanical Engineering or Chemical Engineering that can provide you a job by graduation. I was lucky to be a student at CSM with internships at big oil (Shell, ExxonMobil) and finding a job in oil and gas was a nightmare. Going to CU Boulder or other engineering school maybe more cost effective and will provide you the same job and same salary as a graduate from CSM. Good luck.
Mines offers lots of majors that are not oil and gas related, such as statistics, applied math, computer science, computer engineering, electrical engineering, materials science, physics, chemistry, civil engineering and economics. Mines students can choose an actuary program and prepare for the actuary exams, and find fantastic positions in the booming insurance industry.
Many Colorado companies that are completely unrelated to the oil and gas industry, such as Google, Microsoft, Oracle, HP, Broadcom, Seagate, Lockheed Martin, Ball Aerospace and General Electric hire Mines graduates. The student would need to major in statistics, mathematics, physics, electrical engineering, engineering physics, computer science etc and not be over focused on petroleum classes. So while yes, the petroleum engineers may need a masters in statistics, EE or CS right now to land a job, Mines allows students to major in any subject they offer. (those chemical engineers/petroleum engineers from Mines will have NO trouble picking up a masters degree, so no harm done at all, they have a solid engineering education and thats useful and helpful for any career).
Its an overall better engineering college that CU Boulder from the standpoint of more rigorous coursework, very small class sizes, and very strong students. CU Boulder Engineering is also strong, but has a slightly lower admission standard than Mines. CU Boulder is also growing at a fast clip, and has a larger number of foreign students, so it feels crowded there right now. That may rectify as CU Boulder hires more faculty, which is their plan.