About three of 10 Cincinnati residents have a four-year college degree or better, making Cincinnati the most educated city in Ohio.

        New Census estimates show that 30.7 percent of Cincinnati residents have at least a bachelor's degree. That's a better average than other major Ohio cities, the state and even the United States overall.

        The high level of academic achievement is no surprise to Johnathan Holifield, whose job is to convince companies that a lot of smart people live in the Queen City.

        “It's not only good for attracting companies,” said Mr. Holifield, the Greater Cincinnati Chamber of Commerce vice president of new economy enterprise. “It is also great to know our region is positioned with the kind of brainpower to remain competitive.”

        The education figures are part of a batch of new figures released last week by the Census Bureau that measure levels of income and poverty and other social data.

        Based on a sampling of 2,865 Cincinnati and suburban Hamilton and Butler county households, the estimates differ from the actual 2000 Census count of all households, which will be released next year.

        The survey data have error margins that vary depending on the category. For example, the Census Bureau estimates Cincinnati's rate of obtaining four-year degrees might be as high as 34 percent or as low as 27.4 percent.

        So far, Census estimates paint a mixed portrait of life in Cincinnati:

        • The city has a higher percentage of poor people than all but a dozen cities nationwide, but poverty among young children is decreasing.

        • Commute times are increasing but still trail the U.S. average.

        • The city's annual median household income — $27,781 — is the sixth lowest of 64 large cities. Cities with the highest income levels, such as San Jose, Calif., and San Francisco, are among the most educated, too.

        Yet the hefty paychecks of Silicon Valley don't tell the entire story, Mr. Holifield said. It costs more to live there, and traffic can make running simple errands a hassle.

        “There is a temptation to look at what's just on paper,” Mr. Holifield said. “You also have to look at cost of living and quality of life.”

        A lot of graduates of local universities choose to live in Cincinnati because of the abundance of white-collar jobs. The University of Cincinnati says 50.9 percent of its alumni live in Greater Cincinnati.

        About four out of five Xavier University students hail from Ohio or Northern Kentucky, Mark Camille, dean of admissions, said.

        “Even if students come in from another part of the country, they grow an affection for this area,” Mr. Camille said. “They go to work in the area. That's a big draw for us.”

        While Cincinnati boasts that almost one out of three of its residents are college graduates, Cleveland's rate, 11.8 percent, is the lowest in the state among major cities. Hamilton County's college graduation rate (30.2 percent) trails Cincinnati by just a half-percentage point. Butler County's rate is 21 percent.

        The four-year degree rate for Ohio is 20.6 percent, compared to 25.3 percent for the nation.

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