Higher Ed to be 'flushed down the toilet'?

Under a sky dark with foreboding, the state's four-year colleges, students and employees gathered on the State Capitol steps Thursday to give the Legislature a message: Curb the cuts.

"Colleges are on the brink of losing half of the funding we had just three years ago," said Iris Maute-Gibson, a Western Washington University junior.

Central Washington University President Jim Gaudino, whose student body comes predominantly from the Puget Sound area, warned that colleges in the Evergreen State are "at a tipping point."

"We could begin to dismantle one of the best systems the world has," Guadino added.