Student Profile: Ethan Williams

Ethan Williams is an undergraduate student studying mining engineering. Learn more about his development with mining below:

Tell me a little about yourself and what you’re studying.

Right now, I'm a junior in mining engineering, and I've had one professional internship with the University that was mining focused.

What got you interested in the mining industry? 

Being in Montana, my dad would always drive me around to lots of different places. In some of those places, the whole town and economy was based on mining. I found that to be amazing; I thought it was so cool that almost every place I went to had such a deep mining history. 

I thought the machinery was really cool as a kid, with all kinds of explosions. There were a lot of the general mining things I just adored. I went on a couple underground tours into mines, and I thought that was fascinating.

What has your experience been like with the University of Arizona mining engineering program?

Very early on, I found some good mentors who affirmed my decision in mining, and a lot of the things they told me at the time really panned out. There's so many different routes in mining, and one of the big sellers was that mining engineering is more diverse of a field than mechanical engineering. There's more job opportunities and different fields you could go to. I thought that was cool, that I didn't really have to make a full decision of what I wanted to do. I knew I liked mining, but I still don't really know what I want to do. I hope internships will help round my idea, and so far, they’ve helped.

What’s been the most meaningful part of being at the University of Arizona?

The most meaningful experience I've been given due to the U of A would be the professional development club, SME. I'm in there and I know most of my mining peers because of this club. They have allowed me to go on sort of expensive trips that I would not have been able to fund myself to, for instance Denver and to Phoenix, for these big mining conferences. At these conferences, there's about 500 companies or so that all have talks and presentations, but I feel like I got my most valuable experience talking to real world industry partners and networking with them.

What would you tell someone who’s interested in getting involved with mining but is unsure?

One of the statistics I was told was that there is almost no other industry that has a 100% job placement rate. Mining has been in all of our pasts, and it will be all of our future, and I chose this specifically because of its security. I know there will always be mines. There's always going to be a need for metal, and there's always going to be an economy around that.