Republican gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman today announced leaders of her Students for Meg Coalition, including some here in the Bay Area.

“I am counting on the energy, ideas and determination of California’s young voters to move our state in a new direction,” Whitman said in her news release. “Creating jobs is my top priority. I want the next generation of Californians to be able to start their careers and build their lives here. This important coalition will be key to sharing my vision for A New California with college and university students around the state.”

“We’re joining Meg because she has the right ideas for California – more jobs and better schools,” Kelly Steele, a student at University of California, Riverside, said in the release. “It’s critical students’ voices be heard. We will work hard to get out the vote and encourage students across California to go to the polls.”

One of the statewide co-chairs will be former Stanford Conservative Society President Tommy Schultz; the Bay Area regional co-chairs will be Ashley Carlisle of Stanford University and Mia Lincoln of the University of California, Berkeley. Students for Meg Chapters have been launched on campuses including Stanford; Cal; California State University, East Bay; San Jose State University; Saint Mary’s College of California; and Santa Clara University, the release says.

Whitman proposes to “identify and implement at least $15 billion in spending cuts from the state budget,” according to her campaign Web site; the site’s section on education addresses K-12 but not higher education, which currently accounts for about 12.5 percent of California’s General Fund spending.

Given that, and given last week’s “Day of Action” protests in which students’, parents’ and teachers’ frustration with deep budget cuts and corresponding student fee hikes boiled over into the streets, I would have liked to have asked Whitman – when I saw her today at the Port of Oakland – how she’ll reconcile her spending-cut plan with the hopes and dreams of current and future state university students.

But, no.