Jamie Lamartin of Annapolis started college immediately after high school, but life got in the way.

She married a fellow student, and they started a family. She dropped out with every intention of returning for a degree. But even when her son entered school, there wasn't enough time. "I was never able to finish," said Lamartin, 49.

Now she is back in classes at the Annapolis campus of the Baltimore-based Sojourner-Douglass College, which caters to nontraditional students such as Lamartin. Sojourner-Douglass broke ground last week for a $2 million, 16,000-square-foot facility in Edgewater.

"This new facility is obviously going to expand higher education's ability to empower people to become decision-makers in the community," said Gov. Parris N. Glendening at the ceremony on the Stepneys Lane site.

The new building, which is expected to open in 2004, will triple the college's space in Anne Arundel County.

The Sojourner-Douglass site in Annapolis includes four classrooms in an office building on Old Solomons Island Road that is crowded with more than 200 students. The new building will serve about 500 students with 12 classrooms, a multipurpose room, a library and a bookstore. It will draw students not only from Annapolis and the southern part of the county, but also from Calvert, Charles and St. Mary's counties, said Charlestine Fairley, director of the Annapolis campus.

In the realm of higher education, Sojourner-Douglass College is relatively young. The private institution began as a Baltimore outreach of the Ohio-based Antioch College in the 1970s and became independent in 1980.

Named for African-American abolitionists Sojourner Truth and Frederick Douglass, the college has small satellite campuses in Cambridge, Salisbury, Prince George's County and the Bahamas.

Growing fast

Growth in enrollment is funding the school's expansion, said Charles W. Simmons, the college's president. In the past five years, total enrollment has climbed from 200 students to more than 1,800.

"It's growing so fast our problem is space as opposed to revenue," Simmons said.

The expansion in Anne Arundel County is taking place during an economic slump that is likely to get worse for higher education.

Simmons said he, like officials at the state's public schools, received a letter from the state before last month's election warning of cuts in higher education to solve a $600 million shortfall in the budget.

The state gives Maryland's private colleges aid based on enrollment, but it is a fraction of the funding the state provides public institutions.

Glendening said that during his time as governor such state contributions to Sojourner-Douglass have increased from $194,000 to $1.3 million annually.

Round of cuts

Gov.-elect Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. warned Wednesday that Maryland's colleges and universities could suffer a second round of cuts as he grapples with the $1.2 billion deficit in next year's budget. Ehrlich has suggested that cuts in higher education should come from administration and campus construction.

Without directly mentioning the governor-elect, Glendening criticized such cuts during his remarks at the Sojourner-Douglass groundbreaking.

"You can't turn education on and off like a spigot," he said. "When we do that, we're balancing the budget on the backs of the community."

Such concerns have slowed the growth of Sojourner-Douglass. "The basis of our growth is that we are serving a population with needs that are not being met," Simmons said.

While older students at other schools are served only by continuing-education programs, they are the main focus of Sojourner-Douglass, where the average student is 37, Fairley said.

Seeing results

The college offers night classes and free child care. It also operates on a trimester system, allowing students to earn a four-year degree in three years. Its degree programs include business administration, human services and social work.

Lamartin said she appreciates the college's schedule, which has allowed her to keep a day job teaching computer skills and be a full-time student. After a little more than two years of classes, she has less than a year before she receives her degree in information systems administrations.

"If you put in your time and you're committed," she said, "you'll see the results."