The first "M-Day" homecoming celebration occurred on October 5, 1912 with the construction of the "M" on M-Hill, the school's mountain monogram.

[14] In September 2012, South Dakota Mines made national news when Bloomberg announced that it had passed Harvard in the category of starting salaries for graduates.

[15] On September 19, Tech President Robert A. Wharton died due to complications of cancer treatments.

[22] The campus is located in the center of Rapid City, on the northern slope of small foothills of the Black Hills.

The public exhibits of the museum have been housed since 1944 in the second floor of the then newly completed O'Harra Building, while the preparation laboratories and collections are held in the James E. Martin Paleontology Center, constructed in 2009.

The history of the athletic programs stretch back to 1895 when the first school football team formed, originally named the "Longhairs".

[25] The school host a variety of college sports which include: football, basketball, volleyball, track, cross country, golf, and men's soccer.

The school is a member of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and competes at the Division II level.

[26] The school joined the Division II Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference in January 2014 for the majority of its sports (effective beginning the 2014–15 school year), except for men's soccer which joined the Great Northwest Athletic Conference (GNAC) for men's soccer in 2013 and football beginning in 2014.