A recent 2010 graduate survey shows the employment rate and starting salaries for Mercyhurst College graduates increased between 2009 and 2010.

According to a March 14 Mercyhurst press release announcing the survey results from the college’s Career Development Center, “95 percent of Mercyhurst College graduates from the Class of 2010 are currently employed or continuing their education, compared to 87 percent from the Class of 2009.”

According to Executive Director of Experiential Learning Kyle Foust, Ph.D., “1,117 were surveyed, and 33 percent responded.”

To perform the survey, “we originally sent out emails,” Foust said.

However, due to the “migration to the Lakers.edu (email system), it was not as fruitful as we had hoped it would have been, so we ended up using phone calls and online surveys,” he said.

Prior to this, emails were usually an effective way to conduct the survey.

Fifty percent of students responded to the survey last year, compared to 33 percent who responded this year.

The job placement rate for “this year was 95 percent compared to 87 last year,” Foust said.

The figures show “more people are employed in full-time jobs related to their major, and the starting salaries for the class of 2010 are higher than the class of 2009,” Foust said.

When asked if the job market is really that much better, Foust said that “the figures from our graduate surveys show it is, but I think there is still a lot of concern out there about the job market.”

Even so, there is hope for the job market.

“We’re starting to see that employers are becoming more comfortable hiring people,” he said.