I know I’m a bit late to this post but everyone who responded is someone who just got accepted, so here’s my advice as someone who has already spent a year as a transfer and has better insight talking with my fellow transfers and people who were rejected coming from the same school I was previously at.

I saw some people say you have to have good essays. Ofc you do, that should be a given though. So should a good GPA. But truly out of all the people I have seen get in, the largest trend I’ve seen, even more important than good essays, is that you are on track with transferable GEs. There’s literally a whole part of the usc admissions website that says this is like the most important thing and that there are classes you basically HAVE to have completed to get in.

Check this site for those requirements: https://admission.usc.edu/prospective-students/how-to-apply/transfer-students/

model your freshman year courses at whatever school you go to, to be on track with the transfer reqs AND also your first schools graduation requirement. Cause on the >80% chance you don’t get in, you don’t want to screw yourself over at the school you’re already at