The USC Office of Admission has seen a small increase in the number of transfer applications received this year, though officials say the jump is not dramatic.

According to Tim Brunold, director of undergraduate admission, the number of transfer applications is up about 3 to 5 percent.

Brunold said the increase of California applicants is not drastically different than the overall increase in applications, though he suspects the slight increase can be attributed to the current turmoil in higher education.

“It’s probably been a 200 application increase from California, which would be proportional to that overall increase,” Brunold said.

With the recent budget cuts to California higher education, state community colleges and University of California schools have had to cut back on the number of courses offered to its students, raising a possible explanation for the increase in transfer applications.

“I wouldn’t say that the increase has been dramatic,” Brunold said. “It’s not as if we are seeing a huge percentage increase from a certain type of school, but there definitely has been a reasonable size increase from the UCs. Last year we got about 400 from the UC system, and this year we have about 450 — an increase that is more than coincidental.”

According to preliminary data, the quality of the transfer applicant pool has also stayed at a high level, a trend that the admission office said it sees every year.

“We do ask for students to self-report what their GPA is, and that number is at the same high quality it has been in past years,” Brunold said. “Those patterns look similar, which is a very positive thing for us.”

For Kevin Khakshouri, a junior majoring in policy, planning and development, his transfer from Santa Monica College to USC brought with it a change in work ethic.

“You have to do a lot more reading; it’s basically more work,” Khakshouri said of his transition to USC. “I could get by without doing the reading, whereas at ’SC I can’t wait till the last minute. I have to stay consistent.”

For USC, the recent transfer applicant pool is indicative of the increasing caliber of students looking to transfer.

“Our transfer applicants are very high quality. Last year the average transfer had a 3.65 GPA. Every indication so far is that the quality has stayed the same. It certainly has not gone down,” Brunold said. “It’s getting to the point where the typical rate of transfer admission is similar to freshman admits.”