Critical industries · NCES IPEDS, 2015–2022
Mining and metals
The people who open mines and process ore. Geology is excluded deliberately. It is fifteen times the volume and spans hydrology, climate and petroleum work, so including it would describe earth science rather than mining.
56.4%
of research doctorates in this field go to non-residents
+29.4 points against the 27.0% national figure
303
doctorates awarded in the window
171 of them to non-residents
8
institutions award this doctorate at all
the whole national capacity
44.1%
the share in 2025, the most recent year published
no federal access regime applies by default
No federal access restriction by default
No export-control or access-authorisation regime applies by default. Some critical-minerals work carries federal funding conditions, which are grant terms and not a personnel restriction.
The American share, by award level
The same field at three levels, in 2025. The subject does not change. Only the level does.
| Level | Awarded to Americans | Share American | Awarded to non-residents | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bachelor's | 212 | 94.2% | 13 | 225 |
| Master's | 51 | 44.7% | 63 | 114 |
| Doctorate | 19 | 55.9% | 15 | 34 |
Americans take 94.2% of the 225 bachelor’s degrees in this field and 44.7% of the 114 master’s degrees. The American share falls 49.5 points between the two, and the graduate degree is the one these industries hire from. See the master’s expansion for the same comparison across every field. A row resting on a few dozen awards moves on one student, so read the small ones with the award count beside them.
The programmes behind the number
Every CIP code this page counts, and what each contributes. Disagree with the mapping and you can see exactly which rows to drop.
| Programme | Non-resident share | Doctorates | Non-residents |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mining and Mineral Engineering CIP 14.2101 | 65.0% | 163 | 106 |
| Metallurgical Engineering CIP 14.2001 | 46.4% | 140 | 65 |
Where it is taught
The institutions awarding these doctorates, largest first. Ten or more over the window.
| Institution | Non-resident share | Doctorates | Non-residents |
|---|---|---|---|
| Colorado School of Mines | 36.3% | 102 | 37 |
| University of Utah | 67.7% | 62 | 42 |
| Missouri University of Science and Technology | 57.7% | 52 | 30 |
| Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University | 66.7% | 27 | 18 |
| University of Kentucky | 70.8% | 24 | 17 |
| University of Arizona | 78.3% | 23 | 18 |
| University of Nevada-Reno | 66.7% | 12 | 8 |
The share since 1995
Non-resident share of the doctorates awarded each year, against the national figure for all fields.
The line runs the full published history. The headline 56.4% above is pooled over 2015–2022. That is the window this site uses everywhere. The two figures answer different questions and will not match. Years with fewer than 20 doctorates nationally are omitted: a share computed on a dozen degrees moves on one student.
The current state, on the record
What is being said about this workforce, with the federal figures that sit beside it. The statements are fixed. The figures are recomputed from IPEDS on every build, so the two cannot drift apart.
Doug Burgum, US Secretary of the Interior · 2026-09-29
“The current estimate is that last year we graduated less than 300 graduates across the 17 remaining schools of mines.”
| What the federal data measures | On the record | IPEDS |
|---|---|---|
| Mining and mineral engineering credentials awarded nationally, all levels CIP 14.2101, 2025 | fewer than 300 | 256 |
| Institutions awarding those credentials CIP 14.2101, 2025 | 17 | 15 |
Both rows count the same programme, mining and mineral engineering. "School of mines" is not an IPEDS category, so the institution count is the closest equivalent this data holds: colleges awarding a credential in that programme. Adding metallurgical engineering would raise the institution count to 18 and the graduate count past 400, which is why the two rows are kept to one programme.
Source · Quoted from the video's original-language automatic caption track (en-orig), retrieved 2026-10-01. Automatic captions carry transcription errors; the wording is as captioned, and a second English track on the same video is a machine translation of a Russian dub and was not used.
Doug Burgum, US Secretary of the Interior · 2026-09-29
“As a side note, we did graduate 36,000 lawyers last year.”
| What the federal data measures | On the record | IPEDS |
|---|---|---|
| Law degrees awarded nationally, all levels CIP 22.0101, 2025 | 36,000 | 36,920 |
Source · Same source and caption track as above.
Doug Burgum, US Secretary of the Interior · 2026-09-29
“Estimate is that China graduated 12,000.”
This figure concerns Chinese institutions. This site measures US institutions through IPEDS and holds no data on graduate counts abroad, so there is nothing here to set beside it. It is recorded as stated.
Source · Same source and caption track as above.
Method and limits
- A CIP code is a field of study. Nobody in this data is observed working in the industry it is matched to.
- The battery entry is a proxy built from materials programmes, because IPEDS publishes no battery category.
- Shares are of degrees awarded, not of the current workforce. A doctorate awarded in 2016 may have left the country or the field.
- 'Non-resident alien' is the IPEDS reporting category: a student on a temporary visa. Permanent residents are counted as domestic.
- The restriction note states the law as written. It is not an observed hiring outcome. This data cannot show who was employed, under what authorisation, or whether they stayed.
- Export control, access authorisation and a security clearance are three different things. Only a DOE L or Q access authorisation requires US citizenship.
Built by scripts/build_critical_industries.py from
NCES IPEDS Completions, research doctorates, 2015-2022.
Compare the others on the hub.