Spring Break
SLU will join the Workers' Rights Consortium
Kat Patke
Issue date: 4/27/07 Section: News
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In 1999, one Saint Louis University student began a campaign to ensure that SLU would continue the fight against sweatshops.
On Tuesday, April 24, SLU President Lawrence Biondi, S.J., made the final decision to join the Workers' Rights Consortium, an organization that strives to prevent inhumane factory working conditions. A campaign eight years in the making is now over.
By choosing to affiliate with the WRC, SLU will join more than 100 other colleges and universities across the U.S. in their mission to ensure that the factories producing items with their college logo, such as clothing, comply with basic labor rights of workers.
The WRC investigates working conditions of factories where the affiliate university's merchandise is manufactured, after which a comprehensive report about any violation is compiled and released to the university and the general public. The WRC then works to rectify problems that are found either during their own factory assessments or in complaints that are filed with the WRC by workers.
Despite the positive impact of the WRC in factories across the world, the initiative did not take off immediately.
There were concerns among members of the President's Coordinating Council that, under the WRC's regulations, any factories found to have broken codes of conduct would be closed down, leaving all the workers out of a job and effectively making a bad situation worse.
"The question then came up, 'Is it just for us to support an organization that could cause this to happen?'" said Evan Krauss, SGA president and the only student member of the PCC.
However, since part of the foundation of the WRC is to educate factory owners about running a plant that is respectful of labor rights, members of SLU United Students Against Sweatshops assured the PCC that shutting down factories was not the way the WRC operated.
The final decision does not come as a complete surprise-many were fairly convinced it would pass beforehand, including Krauss.
On Tuesday, April 24, SLU President Lawrence Biondi, S.J., made the final decision to join the Workers' Rights Consortium, an organization that strives to prevent inhumane factory working conditions. A campaign eight years in the making is now over.
By choosing to affiliate with the WRC, SLU will join more than 100 other colleges and universities across the U.S. in their mission to ensure that the factories producing items with their college logo, such as clothing, comply with basic labor rights of workers.
The WRC investigates working conditions of factories where the affiliate university's merchandise is manufactured, after which a comprehensive report about any violation is compiled and released to the university and the general public. The WRC then works to rectify problems that are found either during their own factory assessments or in complaints that are filed with the WRC by workers.
Despite the positive impact of the WRC in factories across the world, the initiative did not take off immediately.
There were concerns among members of the President's Coordinating Council that, under the WRC's regulations, any factories found to have broken codes of conduct would be closed down, leaving all the workers out of a job and effectively making a bad situation worse.
"The question then came up, 'Is it just for us to support an organization that could cause this to happen?'" said Evan Krauss, SGA president and the only student member of the PCC.
However, since part of the foundation of the WRC is to educate factory owners about running a plant that is respectful of labor rights, members of SLU United Students Against Sweatshops assured the PCC that shutting down factories was not the way the WRC operated.
The final decision does not come as a complete surprise-many were fairly convinced it would pass beforehand, including Krauss.
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