By Brian Bohl

Graduating seniors can breath a sigh of relief as a recent survey found there are now more options for employment.More than 60 percent of employers said they expect to hire more recent graduates this year, according to the National Association of Colleges and Employers, which would be an increase of 14.5 percent from 2005.The upswing in the job market has University administrators excited about finding suitable career opportunities for seniors when they leave campus. “It helps a lot in the job market simply to be optimistic,” said Marvin Reed, the director of the University’s Career Center. “We’re really pleased. It’s a healthy market again. People get discouraged and a lot of them just quit looking when there is prolonged bad news about the job market, which is a tragedy.”Marketing and sales occupations, along with executive and administrative positions, are among the fields projected by the Federal Bureau of Labor Statistics to grow in the coming years. Network systems and data communications analysts, home health care professionals and medical assistants are three of the fastest growing occupations in the country, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. “Some of the key industries we’ve seen are investment banking and advertising,” Reed said. “Changes have been very dramatic in the financial industry. Now [companies] are back on campus to recruit.” Despite the variety of jobs forecast to become more available, not all current and former University students are having an easy time finding a job.”I’ve noticed that a lot of the jobs out there aren’t what I thought it would be like,” said John Batanchiev, who graduated from the University last year. “It’s been hard to find jobs with a decent salary.”Michael Cohen, a 2005 public relations graduate at the University, said he could have easily settled for a job, but landing a job with a decent salary and a chance for promotion proved to be more difficult. “I have found that there have been a lot of responses to my resume, however much of them are with job fields that usually have quick turn-over ratios, such as sales positions,” Cohen said. “I understood that entry level jobs are very competitive in sports PR. So while it was exciting after graduation getting all these calls from companies, it was also extremely frustrating not landing the types of interviews I initially wanted.”The NACE released a report in late February that the most lucrative majors are in the math and science disciplines. Chemical engineers lead the way, with graduates earning an average starting salary of $55,900. “Seven of the top-10 majors with the highest starting salary offers saw increases in their offers over last year,” said Marilyn Mackes, executive director of NACE, in a press release. “Engineering remains strong, and another high point comes for b economics/finance graduates, who saw a spectacular 11 percent increase to their average starting salary offers.”Reed said job seekers should not get discouraged when employment seems low because availability fluctuates in cycles.”When employers go three or four years without doing much hiring, which is exactly what happened, they get to a point where they need to start hiring people again if they want to stay in business,” Reed said. “We’re in that phase, and in some industries they are [even] beyond that.”