In the Media
Washington state can’t wait until next year to cut its budget, the state’s budget director told legislators Monday.
Republican lawmakers steadfastly opposed to any tax increases suggested by Democrats say they have other ideas for raising money to help plug a $2 billion state budget shortfall.
Their biggest proposal on the table: gambling.
"The politics of the university are so intense because the stakes are so low," is a frequent quote attributed to Columbia University political scientist Wallace Sayre. Anyone who has dozed through a committee meeting on curricular projects or office assignments can relate.
But politics can be big-time at the university level, as in the case of Richard Lariviere, professor of Sanskrit and president of the University of Oregon for less than three years until his firing Nov. 28 by the State Board of Higher Education.
In the student design competition, Kristen-Lehua Barcheski of Western Washington University Bellingham won first place for a lightweight rotomolded saddle stand, shaped like the curve of a horse’s spine. She won $2,000.
Second place went to Noah Jack, also of Western Washington University, for a rotomolded tank that mounts on a bicycle, for transporting water in Africa.
One lesson I have learned over and over again as a student of WWU is how to live on limited resources; food and money. It is always a sad time when you realize you have spent too much of your financial aid refund money too quickly, and now it's back to Top Ramen and 50-cent macaroni and cheese, compliments of Fred Meyer's generic brand.
If you spend the greater amount of your fishing time, fishing the saltwater scene in Washington, then December 1st is a holy day. Remembering that I am getting older than dirt, as I've fished this state chasing salmon since I was six years old back in '53 A.D., well, you do the math, December 1st is the annual blackmouth opener in the San Juan Islands and while you read, I'm fishing!
Most colleges force a student to take medical leave only as a last resort when responding to a student who is at risk of harming him- or herself. But in some cases, many student affairs officials say, it’s the best option.
SEN. Ed Murray has it right — that any ballot question asking voters to approve tax increases has to follow legislative action that fills the $2 billion shortfall.
Otherwise, the Senate Ways and Means chair told Seattle Times reporter Andrew Garber, voters will not believe the Legislature will cut.
That is right. Cut, then ask voters for money to restore programs.
or most of us, Washington's economy has never been this bad. Since the mortgage bubble popped we've lost more jobs faster, and recovered more slowly, than at any time since the Second World War. That includes iconic slumps such as the Boeing Bust, the early-'80s double-dip and the dot-com crash barely a decade ago.
A highly trained work force was a decisive factor – probably the decisive factor – in Boeing’s decision to build the 737 Max in Washington.
Paying attention, lawmakers?
Supporters of a first-rate educational system – ourselves among them – tend to talk themselves silly about the connection between schooling, economic growth and jobs. But abstract statistics aren’t nearly as persuasive as the 20,000 jobs the 737 Max project will nail down in this state for many years to come.
The equation behind this triumph was simple: Good public schools + work force training + university engineering programs = busy assembly lines in Renton. And all of the above hinges on healthy funding for Washington’s K-12 system and public colleges.