GOLDEN WEST COLLEGE at night.

There are community college campuses in Garden Grove, Huntington Beach and Westminster. As convenient as that it is, might it be even nicer if they were also universities?

The idea is not so far-fetched.

The concept being floated now is called “California University,” which would put the University of California, the California State University and public community colleges all into the same system.

Normally, I would abhor the centralization and increased bureaucracy of a bigger and allegedly “better” entity. But there are certain reasons to give it some consideration.

Community college enrollment is down, and some campuses are (relative) ghost towns. On the other hand, the UC and CSU systems are overflowing and crowded. CSU Fullerton, for example, has a reported enrollment of 33,382 undergraduate students and 41,000 overall if you add in the grad students.

And yet, there are empty classrooms in many community colleges. At the same time, graduates of two-year schools who qualify academically to transfer to the four-year schools may not be accepted simply because there’s no space.

Of course, there are many obstacles to this idea. The UC system is intended to be focused on research, while the CSU is more of a teaching operation and community colleges combine the academic and the vocational.

There are emotional concerns as well. Would there be prestige to UCLA if married to Los Angeles City College?

Another approach would be to allow JCs to widely offer bachelor of arts degrees in certain disciplines, but the four-year schools would likely howl.

It’s bold idea, and may see more support as the number of students who want to attend universities continues to exceed the seats for them.