It's been a month since classes started, and Joe Curigliano is still adjusting to the change. He spent his first two years of college at Penn State Beaver Campus before moving to University Park this fall.

Thousands of students transfer from commonwealth campuses to University Park each year. Curigliano (junior-management and international business) is one of them.

Curigliano pointed out the many differences between the Beaver and University Park campuses, but he said the biggest is the number of students here.

"There are a total of 750 students at Beaver. My first class here had 752 people," he said.

Curigliano said he received very little information about the University Park campus before the semester started.

"I got the book that first-year students get in the mail, but I live off campus, so I was more interested in maps and college orientation than the ice cream social in West Halls," he said.

Curigliano had visited University Park before and knew where the HUB-Robeson Center was because he had been their as a member of student government at the Beaver campus. Besides that experience, Curigliano relied solely on a map he received from his Smeal College of Business Administration orientation.

Mike Cooper, president of the Council of Commonwealth Student Governments, is looking to aid students like Curigliano in the transition.

"We hope to formulate some type of program to acclimate change-of-assignment students to University Park," he said.

Cooper said this program should include an overview of the different advising systems at this campus, as well as a tour of where the Ritenour Building and the ID+ offices are located.

"The point isn't to give them a full orientation like freshmen get, but allow them to feel like juniors and seniors and sophomores instead of freshmen," Cooper said.

Despite the students who are moving to University Park to finish their college careers, there has been a slight downward trend in the number of change-of-assignment students in the past five years.

Last year, 3,690 Penn State students changed their campus assignment, compared to 4,516 in 1997, university spokesman Tysen Kendig said.

The decreasing number of students changing assignment can be attributed to the university's effort to increase the number of bachelor degree programs offered at other Penn State campuses, university spokesman Bill Mahon said.

"Many started out as two-year campuses, but we've made an effort to try to offer four, five or six bachelor degree options," Mahon said.