Washington's higher ed priority: posh dorms

Officials at Washington State University announced last week that the school plans to build new dorms. On the face of it, the initiative seems long overdue: The school hasn't built dorms in 37 years. However, the $26 million dollar residence hall adds only 229 beds, at a cost of $113,537 per bed. The residence hall is part of a larger plan to upscale the dorm experience.

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How we fare in the quest for academic pork

The respected Chronicle of Higher Education has just published a new report on the scramble for academic earmarks. A surprise, considering how well the University of Washington does in federally funded research and how well placed Sen. Patty Murray is: The UW is not among the leading porkers.

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Can't afford UW? Better go to Stanford

Stanford University has announced, in keeping up with the Harvards, that parents earning less than $100,000 will no longer pay tuition. Families earning below $60,000 don't have to pay for room and board. (Total for a year at Stanford, including meals and lodging, is now $47,200.) Pretty sweet deal for the next generation of the elite. The story, lovingly treated by the major national papers, recalls to me a conversation I had with the distinguished American historian Richard White, who was at the time just announcing his departing from U.W. to go teach at Stanford. One reason, he told me, was the greater student diversity, and lower median family income, at Stanford.

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Rick redux — and now redemption

I've always thought that the loathing for Rick Neuheisel was out of proportion to his misdeeds. Yes, the former Husky football coach broke rules and definitely lied about his interest in a job elsewhere. He earned the nickname Slick Rick even before he came to Washington.

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UW picks Everett for a new campus, and the dominoes start tumbling

The University of Washington yesterday announced its leading candidate for a North Campus: downtown Everett. Immediately the dominoes began to tumble in this high-stakes game for a new branch campus. At stake: Will Everett become a new economic power center in central Puget Sound? Will UW phase way back its Bothell campus? Will the UW be the loser as the Legislature snatches lightbulbs, stealing from UW funds to build the 5,000-person campus in Everett? Will congestion issues for the Everett location, made worse by failure of Proposition 1, hamper that site? And will the whole idea be shelved, given a stalling economy and the UW's clout in protecting its home base?

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To Kelso by way of Pullman, Moscow, and Ireland

It's been a long journey to the trial of Frederick David Russell, who is charged with vehicular homicide related to an awful 2001 accident on the highway between Pullman, Wash., and Moscow, Idaho. He fled to Ireland, and now the trial is being held in Kelso, Wash.

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Is a species endangered if you can't find it?

That's just one of the questions raised by the mystery of the great white worm of the Palouse — a lilly-scented, spitting underground enigma.

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A star rises in Eastern Washington

Whatever the prospects for Cougar football, the hard-charging person to watch in Pullman is Elson Floyd, the new president of Washington State University.

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Standing up to the big mag on campus

Several Northwest colleges, including the University of Washington, did well in the imperfect annual ranking by U.S. News and World Report, but there's a revolt brewing, and Reed College is a leading dissenter.

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