Class room. (Real Estate).

Cal State Bakersfield, searching for a permanent campus in the West Valley, is in the market for a large piece of land in Lancaster or Palmdale.

Having seen enrollment at its Antelope Valley campus double in the past two years, the school applied to the California Postsecondary Education Commission for permanent status last month.

"Within the next year or two, we would hope to have that site locked down," said Michelle St. John, interim director at California State University of Bakersfield Antelope Valley Campus."

St. John, who did not know how many students the new campus would need to accommodate, said Cal State San Bernardino has raised $28 million for the three-phase build-out of its Palm Desert campus, to be completed in 2005. The land for that campus was donated by the city of Palm Desert.

Meanwhile, CSUB Antelope Valley, which began offering classes in winter 1996 and has increased its enrollment to 1,000 students this fall from less than 500 two years ago, is looking to lease 60,000 square feet of classroom space to supplement the four temporary buildings it occupies at the northeast corner of Antelope Valley College in Lancaster.

If and when the campus gets its own moniker remains to be seen.

"The operation of a permanent site would be under Cal State Bakersfield (which itself considered part of Fresno State until 1970) until the chancellor deems it its own campus," said St. John. "But let's face it, that's how new campuses are developed."

Staff reporter Danny King can be reached at [phone] ext. 230, or at [e-mail].