AUBURN — Answering a call from the Lewiston-Auburn business community, Southern New Hampshire University is planning to offer a master of business administration degree in January at Central Maine Community College, a first for the area.

The area has needed an MBA program for more than 10 years, Androscoggin County Chamber of Commerce President Charles “Chip” Morrison said Tuesday, adding he’s thrilled a program may start.

“Whenever we do surveys it’s something people want educationally,” Morrison said. “It’s one of the things people have said: ‘There’s nowhere to get an MBA in the community.'” Every time the chamber was asked by education leaders “’what do we want?’ I’d say ‘I want an MBA program,’” Morrison said.

The University of Southern Maine Lewiston-Auburn College offers several graduate degree programs, including a leadership in organizational studies that prepares students for work at nonprofits and other organizations. But it does not offer a “generic usable business degree that would really help people further their careers,” Morrison said. “USM has a good business school, but all of their courses have to be taken in Portland.”

Southern New Hampshire heard the area needed a MBA. “They said, ‘We’re going to try to come up with a way,’” Morrison said.

Bo Yerxa, who directs SNHU’s Brunswick center, said his college has been drawing students from Lewiston-Auburn to Cook’s Corner for years. Before making plans he talked to CMCC officials and USM-LA Dean Joyce Gibson. “I didn’t want her to think we were poaching,” Yerxa said.

“We have a robust MBA program that we were asked to bring.” They plan to do that as long as they get enough students. “We would like 20,” he said.

After talking to potential students, SNHU plans to offer daylong MBA classes in Auburn every other Saturday. Students would also take classes online. With that, students could get their MBA in 18 months, providing they don’t need other courses to ready them for the program, he said.

The cost would be $1,047 a class, which is comparable to the University of Maine System’s graduate level courses.

Most people interested in enrolling in an MBA program “are looking at moving up in the corporate world or high levels within government or a nonprofit sector,” he said. They need to know a little bit about finance, accounting and human resources. “When employers are looking to hire they have more confidence that somebody with an MBA understands enough about those different sectors to be able to function at a pretty high level.”

The number of MBA students at the Brunswick center has increased in the tough economy, Yerxa said. Many want to improve their skills and credentials, making them more marketable, he said.

USM doesn’t offer an MBA in Lewiston because it doesn’t have enough professors, said spokesman Bob Caswell. USM’s School of Business has a prestigious accreditation. To maintain that, a certain ratio of professors with PhDs are needed. “We simply don’t have the capacity to deliver” that kind program to Lewiston-Auburn, Caswell said.

USM “wishes SNHU well in any program that can help the people of Androscoggin receive whatever training and education they need. This is good news.”

Central Maine Community College President Scott Knapp said he’s delighted an MBA program will be offered.

“I have three people here at the college who are graduates of the program, but they had to get it in Brunswick,” Knapp said. “I now have three, maybe four, here at the college who want to be in the program. It’s something this community needs.”

An MBA is often sought by people in junior administrative positions, Knapp said. It gives someone “more personal potential.”

For more information about the MBA program, go to www.snhu.edu/lewiston