LOS ANGELES -- Hundreds of students and faculty gathered outside Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's downtown offices Monday to protest looming budget cuts that could force the California State University campuses to raise fees and slash enrollment.

The protesters hoisted signs reading "Don't terminate our future' and chanted "No more cuts' in opposition to Schwarzenegger's proposal to trim $240 million, or 9 percent, from CSU's funding.

"The governor says he's for education, but his actions don't match his words,' said Maricruz Rodriguez, 20, a sophomore at Cal State Los Angeles. Rodriguez said the cutbacks would reduce her financial aid while raising her tuition.

The cuts, which Schwarzenegger recommended to help close a $16 billion dollar budget shortfall without raising taxes, would require CSU to reduce enrollment by nearly 20,000, university officials say.

That would affect about 10 percent of incoming freshmen, about 4,200 students, who would be redirected to community colleges. The cuts would also mean increases of 10 percent for undergraduate students and 40 percent for graduate students, on top of 40 percent increases last year.

Schwarzenegger spokesman H.D. Palmer said the budget situation "required savings to be achieved across every aspect of state government, including higher education.'

"In putting together our budget, our goal was to protect and maintain funding for core academic, core instructional programs at both UC and CSU,' he said.

Palmer said the governor was working with leaders of both systems and that "they clearly understand the depth and the breadth of the fiscal crisis that the governor inherited. We'll continue to work with them to try to weather this fiscal crisis.'

John Travis, president of the California Faculty Association, said the cuts would cripple the 23-campus public university system, the nation's largest, following last year's budget reductions of nearly $300 million.

"No more cuts is our message, and we're sticking to it,' Travis told the students and faculty mostly from campuses around Southern California.