In the Media
A center at Western Washington University is celebrating 40 years of teaching U.S.-Canadian relations with two scheduled events in Bellingham this week.
Dr. Donald Alper, Director of the Center for Canadian-American Studies, says the center has recently been focused on security and travel improvements at the border.
Like most club sports at Western Washington University, players on the women's rugby team toil in relative obscurity most of the time - playing their hearts out in a sport they love with few people taking notice other than family and close friends.
"Most of the school is not aware that we exist," said senior Sarah Coe, who plays flanker and serves as forwards captain and president of the club. "Unless you have some friends or roommates on the team, I don't think most people know about us. Rugby might be a little more popular up here. We have a number of fans that come out. But we don't get the publicity of a lot of the (varsity) team sports. When we're doing good, though, we get a little more recognition."
Five years ago, Michael Kirshenbaum researched the impact of public-land fees on lower-income people for his master's thesis at Western Washington University, reporting that the majority of people who no longer used our parks were low-income families and seniors on a fixed income.
Electric violinist Anna Schaad and gypsy-jazz quintet Pearl Django perform with the Whatcom Symphony, conducted by Roger Briggs, at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, April 30, at Mount Baker Theatre, 104 N. Commercial St.
Tickets are $10, $35 and $42; for reservations, call 360-734-6080 or go to mountbakertheatre.com.
Lawmakers were back in Olympia on Tuesday to resume work on closing a $5.1 billion shortfall in the next two-year budget.
The Legislature ran out of time in the regular 105-day session that ended last week and is now in a special session that could drag on for another 30 days.
A special legislative session kicked off Tuesday with senators quickly sending one of the most contentious measures of the regular session back to the House.
The Senate passed a constitutional amendment that would limit the state's debt, a measure that has delayed passage of the $3 billion construction budget. House lawmakers gathered for meetings, but most will head home while negotiators try to hammer out agreements with the Senate.
Today, the King's Schools robotics team, which won the state title in January, flew out of Seattle on the way to St. Louis to compete in FIRST Tech Challenge (FTC) World Championship, which begins Wednesday and continues through Saturday.
Earlier in the day, school staff, the Knights mascot, the cheer team and other King’s Schools students were on hand on campus to wish the robotics team luck as they depart for the competition.
Before they offered the presidency of the University of Washington to Michael Young on Monday, the Board of Regents considered three finalists, all of whom are sitting university presidents, according to the firm hired to help with the search.
Bill Funk, president of consulting firm R. William Funk & Associates, said that demonstrates the candidate pool for UW's top job was a strong one.
As the Washington Legislature comes to a close on this session, there are new narratives and enduring myths about funding for our state's colleges and universities.
Perhaps the most ubiquitous charge is that students should pay more for college - and its corollary that earlier college graduates paid their own way as well.
It should be noted, and this will be either radical or rote for some, that the pursuit of higher education was originally perceived as having a public purpose; that a degree better prepared those who attained it for navigating the world at-large and created a more civic-minded person, an ideal that has contributed to making our country the envy of the world over.
With lawmakers knowing they'd be back after a weekend-long interim, Friday's ending to the regular legislative session was anti-climactic, to put it nicely. Usually, the gavels in the House and Senate are struck at the same time to signal the end. This year, the House went ahead of the Senate, and just went home.