University of Illinois has reportedly received a huge pool of applications from prospective students for its fall semester.

Admissions offices at the Urbana-Champaign, Springfield and Chicago campuses received nearly 48,000 applications for 10,200 openings, four times the available seats. Officials say it is a 6-percent increase over last year, reports Sacramento Bee.

University of Illinois system oversees the three campuses -- Urbana-Champaign, Chicago, and Springfield.

According to the university, 31,454 prospective students applied for the Urbana-Champaign campus' estimated 6,900 available spots. The Springfield campus received 1,553 applications for about 300 spots, and the Chicago campus received 14,976 applications for about 2,900 seats which is five times the available spots.

Both the Urbana-Champaign and Springfield application pools were at a record high, while Chicago's was reported as a 'near-record', reports Chicago Tribune.

"It speaks to the value of a degree. Students realize these are difficult economic times and they're starting to think about what that means," U of I President Robert Easter said to Chicago Sun times.

He also added that due to soaring student debt rates, opting to study in-state and earning a 'quality degree' seems to be a better option to students.

One-in-four applicants were admitted to school; making it a total of 12,000 students spread over three campuses.

The challenge for the three schools was to select the students out of such large pool and finding them necessary financial aid.

"One thing I can say that characterizes the applications this year is there seems to be an increase in areas where clearly there's a career path," Easter said to Chicago Tribune. "I think that indicates students are worried about finding jobs, and their parents probably are encouraging as well."

He also went on to say that when assumed the position of university president, his focus was on understanding the budget and concentrating on stability.

"Over the next several months, we will give quite a lot of attention to the quality of our education mission - and in some places - rebuilding faculty," Easter said.

Classes are scheduled to begin Monday on all three campuses.