But Harvard students do not need to wait for a favorable job market, he said, as long as they are assertive in their employment search.

At Harvard, the job market expansion most clearly manifests itself in increased traffic in the on-campus recruiting program, Wright-Swadel said.

The increase is so great, in fact, that the OCS is running out of space. In response to this problem, Wright-Swadel and OCS staff members are exploring new job-hunting resources for students.

"We are looking for opportunities for virtual career fairs targeting students who are just getting involved in the market," Wright-Swadel said.

According to the CERI study, businesses use the Internet for about 30 percent of their recruiting efforts, though Web-scouting leads to hiring in only 10 to 20 percent of cases.

Joyce M. Koh '01, an East Asian history concentrator, said she was not surprised by the report's projections.

"I'm not particularly encouraged," Koh said. "For me, the hardest part is finding out what I want to do after graduation."