BEIJING - More Chinese college graduates are finding jobs, with the employment rate back to the pre-crisis level and a significant rise in salaries, a latest survey shows.

The employment rate of college graduates has risen over the last two years to 89.6 percent in 2010, about 2 percentage points higher than that in 2007, according to a survey by education research company MyCOS Institute released Thursday.

Some 227,000 college graduates were interviewed for the survey six months after they graduated last year.

In breakdown, 91.2 percent of the university graduates and 88.1 percent of the graduates from junior colleges and higher vocational schools found jobs within six months of graduation, according to the survey.

Meanwhile, college graduates' average monthly starting salary was 2,479 yuan ($381.4) in 2010, 349 yuan higher than the starting salary of those who graduated in 2009, MyCOS said, attributing the rise to rising demand for skilled workers.

The survey also covered some 109,500 employees who graduated from college in 2007. Their average monthly income had reached 4,388 yuan, more than double what they earned three years ago when first interviewed by MyCOS.

China's eastern and costal regions were still the most attractive places to work for college graduates, with Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou as the most appealing cities, according to the survey.

But among those who graduated in 2007, more than 20 percent of them had left the three cities within three years of graduation, it said.

About 60 percent of the interviewees who graduated last year thought their jobs did not match their expectations.

Some 36 percent of these graduates regarded their positions as "inconsistent" with their career plan, while 22 percent of them said the work failed to match their interests.

Jobs not matching career plans was a salient reason why 34 percent of these graduates left their positions within six months of graduation, said MyCOS.

More graduates are starting their own businesses after graduation, with 1.5 percent of graduates becoming self-employed in 2010. Most of the graduates' start-up funding came from parents, relatives, friends and personal savings, according to the survey.