76 ASE accredited diesel programs at 76 schools, ranked for 2027 on cost, graduate earnings, completion and track record. Fox Valley Technical College (Appleton, WI) is first.
By Trevor Rupe, Contributor at Savo Media Group Updated
At a Glance
76 programs hold ASE Education Foundation accreditation in the Medium/Heavy Duty Truck area and meet the federal entry bar.
The median program charges about $5,495 a year in tuition and fees; San Diego Miramar College is lowest at $1,146 a year, in-state.
The median graduation rate is 54%, counted for the whole school.
BLS reports a May 2025 median of $61,770 for bus and truck mechanics and diesel engine specialists (SOC 49-3031).
The score is the same for every diesel mechanic school on the site, so a 70 here means what a 70 means on any other list.
The Top 10 Diesel Mechanic Schools
Each card shows what the diesel mechanic school charges, how many of its students finish and what its graduates earn. The 25 highest-scoring programs of 76. Each score is out of 100 and comes from the method below.
Rank 1
Diesel Equipment Technology
Fox Valley Technical College
Appleton, WI
Score78.9
ASE Accredited Program
Public
Associate Degree (AAS), 65 credit hours
Cost
$5,040a year, in-state
Graduation rate
65%within 150% of normal time
Graduate earnings
$62,822median four years after completing, certificate level; school-wide across its mechanic programs
Awards
57in 2024-25
Why it ranks here
Earns its place with a price toward the low end of ranked diesel programs ($5,040 a year, in-state), graduates earning a median $62,822 and a 65% graduation rate.
Source: IPEDS 2024-25 (provisional), College Scorecard and the ASE accreditation list.
Rank 7
Diesel Powered Equipment Technology
Tennessee College of Applied Technology-Knoxville
Knoxville, TN
Score68.2
ASE Accredited Program
Public
Diesel Technician
Cost
$8,179for the 20-month program (scored as $4,907 a year)
Graduation rate
71%within 150% of normal time
Graduate earnings
$56,468median four years after completing, certificate level; school-wide across its mechanic programs
Awards
30in 2024-25
Why it ranks here
Earns its place with a price toward the low end of ranked diesel programs ($8,179 for the 20-month program), graduates earning a median $56,468 and a 71% graduation rate. Its figures cover its accredited sites in Clinton, TN; Knoxville, TN.
Graduate earnings: four years after finishing, certificate level; school-wide, covering its mechanic programs
Source: school’s published price (2026-27, read November 3, 2026), IPEDS 2024-25 (provisional), College Scorecard and the ASE accreditation list.
Rank 10
Diesel Technology
Mountainland Technical College
Lehi, UT
Score67.5
ASE Accredited Program
Public
Certificate
Cost
$6,150for the 18-month program (scored as $4,100 a year)
Graduation rate
84%within 150% of normal time
Awards
20in 2024-25
Why it ranks here
Earns its place with a price toward the low end of ranked diesel programs ($6,150 for the 18-month program) and an 84% graduation rate. Its figures cover its accredited sites in Lehi, UT; Payson, UT.
Each program is scored out of 100 on five published measures, and the scores are absolute: no program is scaled to the top
one, so a score of 70 means the same thing on every list and every state page. This list is in score order. A program is on this list when the ASE Education Foundation accredits it in the Medium/Heavy Duty Truck area and it meets the entry bar.
The five scored factors and their weights
Factor
Weight
What it reads
Cost
25 of 100
What a year of tuition and fees costs, compared with every other ranked program in the same area.
Graduate Earnings
25 of 100
What the school’s graduates in mechanic and repair programs earn, from federal data.
Completion
20 of 100
The share of the school’s first-time, full-time students who finish within 150% of normal time.
Track Record
15 of 100
How many credentials the program awards in a year.
Program Reputation
15 of 100
A 0 to 4 rating of how employers in the trade regard the program, made by Cloudflare’s Clef language model from the same few facts for every program.
Ties are broken by Cost, then Graduate Earnings, then school name. Scores are shown to one decimal and programs are ordered by the unrounded score, so two programs can show the same score at different ranks. How We Rank gives the formulas, the data sources and the disclosures for each figure.
Medium/Heavy Duty Truck Accreditation From the ASE Education Foundation
The ASE Education Foundation accredits programs, not whole schools, at the secondary and postsecondary levels in three areas: Automobile, Medium/Heavy Duty Truck, and Collision Repair and Refinishing. This list uses the Medium/Heavy Duty Truck area only. Accreditation lasts five years, and a program that does not renew comes off the Foundation’s list. On November 3, 2026, when the list was last read, the ranked program at every diesel mechanic school here held an unexpired accreditation.
Accreditation is not ASE certification. ASE certifies individual technicians: to earn an ASE certification a person passes an ASE test and has full-time, hands-on work experience, or a combination of formal training and experience. The ASE T-series covers medium and heavy truck systems, from Gasoline Engines (T1) to Preventive Maintenance Inspection (T8), and technicians certified in T2 through T8 are recognized as Master Medium-Heavy Truck Technicians. Technicians retest every five years to keep a certification.
What the Numbers Show About Diesel Programs
The list covers 76 diesel programs at 76 schools in 34 states and territories. The median school graduates 54% of its first-time, full-time students, counted over one and a half times the normal program length. The median program charges about $5,495 a year in tuition and fees, from $1,146 a year, in-state at San Diego Miramar College (San Diego, CA) to $43,595 for the 45-week program at Universal Technical Institute-Southern California (Long Beach, CA).
37 of the 76 programs award associate’s degrees, and the rest award certificates. 51 are at public institutions and 21 at private for-profit schools. The states with the most ranked programs are Texas (7), Kentucky (6) and California (5).
How to Choose a Diesel Mechanic School
The first check at any diesel mechanic school is accreditation: the ASE Education Foundation accredits Medium/Heavy Duty Truck programs, not whole colleges. Every program on this list holds it, so the comparison that remains is price, completion and graduate earnings.
A community college charges by the year, and a technical school may price the whole program and show its length. The card prints each price with its unit, so read the unit before you compare what one diesel mechanic school costs with another.
The graduation rate on a card is the whole school’s, and graduate earnings are a College Scorecard median for mechanic and repair graduates. Together they show how many students at a diesel mechanic school finish, and what graduates earn afterward.
A diesel mechanic school is one way in; the career guide explains the on-the-job route the Bureau of Labor Statistics describes.
Questions About Diesel Mechanic Schools
How are the best diesel schools chosen?
Only accredited programs are ranked, and each is scored out of 100 from published federal data. Programs are ranked on cost (25 points), graduate earnings (25), completion (20), track record (15) and program reputation (15). Scores are absolute, and every list and state page keeps the same national scores. How We Rank gives the formulas and the data sources.
How much does diesel school cost?
Among the 76 programs on this list, the median reports about $5,495 a year in tuition and fees for 2024-25, from $1,146 a year, in-state at San Diego Miramar College in San Diego, CA to $43,595 for the 45-week program at Universal Technical Institute-Southern California in Long Beach, CA. Community colleges that charge by the year sit at the low end; schools that price the whole program show that price and its length on each card, and the yearly figure is only what the cost score reads. Books, tools and living costs are not included.
What does the graduation rate on each card measure?
It is the federal graduation rate within 150% of normal time for the whole school: of the first-time, full-time students who started, the share who finished a credential within one and a half times its normal length. It is not a rate for the trade program alone, and a school with a small entering class can show a rate near 0% or 100%.
Where do the graduate earnings figures come from?
They are College Scorecard medians for the school’s graduates in mechanic and repair programs (federal field 47.06), four years after completing where that is published and one year after where it is not. Scorecard pools every mechanic and repair program a school offers at that credential level, and a chain’s campuses share one figure, so a card’s earnings figure describes the school’s graduates in these trades, not one program alone.
How much do diesel technicians earn?
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports a median of $61,770 a year for bus and truck mechanics and diesel engine specialists (SOC 49-3031) in its May 2025 estimates, with the lowest-paid tenth earning under $44,530 and the highest-paid tenth over $88,740. Pay depends on the state, the employer and the work; each state ranking on this site shows the state’s median.
How do I choose a diesel mechanic school?
Start with accreditation in the Medium/Heavy Duty Truck area, which every program on this list holds. Then compare each diesel mechanic school on the price with its unit, the graduation rate and the graduate earnings on its card.
Does a diesel mechanic school have to be ASE accredited to be ranked?
Yes, for this ranking. A program is included only when it holds an unexpired ASE Education Foundation accreditation in the Medium/Heavy Duty Truck area and meets the federal entry bar.
Sources for Diesel Mechanic Schools
U.S. Department of Education, IPEDS Completions (awards July 2024 to June 2025, provisional), tuition and fees for 2024-25, graduation rates within 150% of normal time and the institutional directory.
This site earns money from sponsored school listings served by the education ad network Esyoh, which are marked as ads wherever they appear. Schools pay to appear in those listings, not in the rankings: a listing is not scored, and no listing can change a ranking. Rankings come from published records, and program details from each school’s own published pages.
