Avoid Ivy League Schools. Think Oil League…

In years past, it was assumed that a graduate with an Ivy League degree was assured a lucrative job and a promising future where they would easily payoff any accrued student loans in short order.

Those days are past. Ivy League grads face a tough and uncertain job market, just like their state school peers.

If I had a child headed off to college and looking for a lucrative career, I would steer them toward the Oil or Mining schools instead of the Ivy League.

Shale operators are having a lot of trouble finding workers, particularly engineers and geologists, according to a workforce survey by the Marcellus Shale Coalition. Most of the respondents in the poll cited a need for more schools to offer four-year degree programs in petroleum technology and engineering.

So what schools are in the Oil League? (One hint, they are nowhere near Harvard.) Here are few noted schools offering petroleum engineering degrees and as you can see, most are in the west.

US Petroleum Engineering Programs

School	City	State
University of Texas at Austin	Austin	Texas
Texas A&M	College Station	Texas
Colorado School of Mines	Golden	Colorado
Stanford University	Stanford	California
New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology	Socorro	New Mexico
University of Southern California	Los Angeles	California
University of Oklahoma	Norman	Oklahoma
Texas Tech	Lubbock	Texas
University of Louisiana at Lafayette	Lafayette	Louisiana
University of Alaska	Fairbanks	Alaska

While the arms race among universities focuses on the addition of new programs in Law, Nursing, and Pharmacy, they might have more success by adding new petroleum related programs.

Instead of starting or expanding programs focused on alternative energy sources and environmental sciences, there are a lot of opportunities in fracking, geology, and other area of natural gas and oil drilling for young graduates.

Operators in the oil and gas industry are continually trying to fill positions in engineering and construction which represent a golden opportunity for young graduates looking for a promising career in a difficult employment market and for administrators looking for new degree programs.