Enrollment competition is expected to intensify at California State University, Dominguez Hills, where budget cuts may force the Carson school to turn away 350 students it normally would have accepted for the spring semester.

The reduction is part of a larger effort to cut enrollment growth throughout the CSU system, which lost 13 percent of its budget — or $345.2 million — in the state spending plan signed Saturday by Gov. Gray Davis.

Though the CSU system had expected to increase its enrollment by 7 percent in the coming year, it received funding for just 4.3 percent. Students already accepted for fall and winter semesters are guaranteed spots, but that means there will be fewer seats for those applying in the future. CSU campuses may need to turn away up to 30,000 students.

“We’re not going to serve any fewer students, but we won’t serve as many as we’d hoped we were going to be funded for,” said George Pardon, vice president for administration and finance at Dominguez Hills.

Cal State Dominguez Hills is expected to reject 350 students who normally would have gained admission for the spring semester. Before budget cuts, the 13,500-student university thought it could safely boost enrollment by 5.8 percent — now it has money for just 3 percent.

Though it is not yet known how many people will apply to Dominguez Hills in the spring, last fall the university accepted two-thirds of its 7,122 applicants.

Next year, the situation is even more grim: The CSU system cannot increase enrollment at all. The universities will be able to fill only the spots vacated by graduating seniors.

“There won’t be any real net growth,” Pardon said. “We’ll just cut back on our application deadlines. Once we receive the number of applications based on our anticipated return rate, we’ll just close the applications and won’t accept any more.”

In the meantime, community colleges are bracing for a possible onslaught of students rejected from CSU campuses. The two-year schools themselves have experienced budget cuts and cannot take as many students as previously projected.

“We’re trying to be open to everyone, but also balancing the budget is the bottom line,” said Ann Garten, spokeswoman for El Camino College, which typically sends 900 to 1,200 transfer students a year to CSU schools and is the No. 1 feeder college to Dominguez Hills.

Celina Luna is entering her last year at El Camino College. She plans to transfer to a University of California school but worries that CSU enrollment cuts could affect current community college students.

“A lot of students from our school might find themselves with nowhere to transfer to next year,” Luna said. “They’ll probably have to stay at El Camino and take away seats from other students who need to move through the system.”

Linda Spink, president of Harbor College in Wilmington, echoes the fear of a ripple effect on community colleges.

“If students can’t get into the UCs, they go to CSUs. If they can’t get into CSUs, they go to community colleges. If they come to us and can’t get in here, they don’t go to school, and unfortunately, that’s going to be what’s happening,” Spink said.

Students who cannot transfer to CSU or UC schools may try to secure scholarships for private schools or go part-time until they are accepted, Spink said. Others may simply leave school.

“Our communities are going to feel it,” Spink said.