The priority of most Central New York college students is to get a job after graduation, but nearly a third of them expect to have to leave their hometowns to do so.

That information comes from Project KEEP US, conducted by 19 public relations majors at Syracuse University's Newhouse School. KEEP US looked at nearly 2,000 students at colleges in 12 counties in a semester-long research project designed to find effective ways to keep young people in their college communities after graduation.

More than 87 percent of the students indicated it is was important or very important that they can immediately get or start a job that, at the very least will pay the bills, said Jean Vincent, adjunct faculty and president of the Vincent McCabe public relations firm of Skaneateles.

Vincent taught the junior-level class that conducted the survey.

Just 14 percent of the survey population said they would stay in the area where they went to school. More than 36 percent said they would return to their hometowns and another 35 percent said they would look elsewhere in New York.

A total of 2,299 full-time and part-time students enrolled in undergraduate and graduate degree-granting programs at 25 different institutions completed the study, providing information about decision-making preferences, current studies, work and internship experiences, their dream job and industry preferences.

Project KEEP US report - which stands for Knowledge Enabling Efforts to Preserve University Students - offered only data, and no recommendations. It addressed four objectives.

•  Assessing whether students are staying, leaving or undecided about where to locate upon completing their college education.

•  Determining factors that influence students' decisions to stay or go from the area where they attended college.

•  Identifying student characteristics - by location, by career choices and other factors - to better understand research results.

•  Determining conditions or actions that may surface in the study that may be taken to keep graduates of area colleges in the area.

•  When it comes to the complex decision of where to live after graduation from college or graduate school, there is not a single typical student profile. Rather the survey found there are different types of students with different motivators and needs.

Vincent said there are five different student clusters: better life seekers, homebodies, dreamers, recruitables and careerists, each of which are motivated in a different way. Homebodies want to be near family, recruitables would be open to the best job opportunities, dreamers focus on finding the perfect job without concern to salary or other like benefits, better life seekers are concerned most about quality of life.

Careerists are perhaps the most directed.

"They seek high salaries for jobs in their field; excellent opportunity to land their dream job; the opportunity to immediately get or start a job that will at least pay the bills," Vincent said. "Careerists are not concerned about reasonable cost of living, housing options, neighborhood facilities or a safe, diverse environment, unless it's in a place that is known for their field."

Of the 2,299 participants in the study sample, 13 percent are full-time students pursuing associate's degrees, 1 percent are part-time students pursuing associate's degrees, 66 percent are full-time students pursuing bachelor's degrees, 2 percent are part-time students pursuing bachelor's degrees, 16 percent are full-time students pursuing graduate degrees and 2 percent are part-time students pursuing graduate degrees.

Local government and community officials want to know how to retain and attract creative young people, said Rob Simpson, assistant to the president of the Metropolitan Development Agency, which believes doing so is the key to stimulating the beleaguered upstate economy.

"Anything that adds to the body of knowledge about why students are leaving central New York after graduating is very useful. The key will be - how do we harness that information, and tie in what we find, to develop something really actionable that can help keep them here," Simpson said. "Information is only as good as what you end up doing with it."

Staff writer Louise Hoffman Broach can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 238 or louise.hoffman@lee.net. The Associated Press contributed to this report.