The share of new high-school graduates enrolled in college reached a record high last year, likely reflecting the weak job market they faced.

Some 70.1% of the 2.9 million new graduates between the ages of 16 and 24 headed to colleges and universities, the Labor Department said Tuesday, based on data from January through October 2009. That percentage was a historical high for the data series, which began in 1959.

College-enrollment...