AUBURN – As visitors milled about, business student Joseph Morin showed off the new $5.4 million Central Maine Community College dorm unveiled Friday morning.

The Lakeview Residence Hall will house 150 college students this fall. Because of a lack of housing, many had to drive four hours or more each day, or live at the Fireside Inn in Auburn.

The new building features air conditioning and a fourth floor “Treetops” conference room with a panoramic view of the campus and Lake Auburn. There’s a student lounge on the first floor. Around the corner there’ll be washing machines and dryers.

Students who live there will pay $7,376 a year for their room and meals, plus tuition.

Morin, 26, won’t live in the dorm because he lives close by in Auburn. But he was glad to see the building up.

“It will be good for student morale,” he said. “Everybody feels like this is a step in the right direction.”

The new dorm, CMCC’s second, makes the college feel more like a campus.

“You don’t feel like the ugly stepchild of the University of Maine System because we’re not,” Morin said. “Community college isn’t a stepping stone to college. It is college.”

With annual tuition about half the cost of the University of Maine System, “You can come here and get an awesome two-year associate’s degree,” he said, adding that he’ll get his two-year degree with no student loans.

During Friday’s ribbon-cutting ceremony, Central Maine Community College President Scott Knapp said the new $5.4 million building will help keep pace with growing enrollment.

Since Maine’s technical colleges became community colleges four years ago, statewide enrollment has spiked 47 percent, said system spokeswoman Helen Pelletier.

There are seven community colleges in Maine. “Ten years ago (the Auburn school) was the fifth-largest. Today, we’re the second-largest,” Knapp said.

The Auburn college is the third-fastest growing community college in Maine, behind South Portland and Fairfield, said Community College System President John Fitzsimmons.

That enrollment growth is continuing. “Admissions for 2007 are 22 percent higher than last year,” said Roger Philippon, dean of Planning and Public Affairs.

Knapp attributed the growth to three things: location, programs and cost. Annual tuition for a full-time, in-state student is $3,500. “You can’t beat it,” he said.