U. student signs letter protesting sweatshops

A Penn student joined students at other Ivies in sending the joint letter to university presidents. Although they have yet to meet face-to-face with the administration, a group of Penn students have joined the Ivy League anti-sweatshop campaign and are now seeking an immediate response from University President Judith Rodin. Students at seven of the eight Ivy League schools -- Dartmouth College being the exception -- sent a letter Friday to their universities' respective administrations requesting a "timely, forthright response" to four demands by March 8. The issue has gained prominence during the last month as students at several other schools have staged protests, rallies and sit-ins in response to their schools' use or possible use of sweatshops to produce school-insignia apparel. University officials have said that they are committed to working with the other Ivies and the Association for Collegiate Licensing Administration to develop a policy on labor practices which would then be submitted to Rodin for approval. College junior Miriam Joffe-Block, a member of the Progressive Activist Network, signed the letter on behalf of Penn's student body. "I'm optimistic that this will get the administration to see that this is an important issue to us," Joffe-Block said, adding that she thinks the letter will help to "pull [Penn] into the loop" of activism. The first stipulation outlined in the letter calls for increased student involvement on the sweatshop issue, urging the schools to permit at least one student representative from each university to attend the next meeting of the Ivy League taskforce on sweatshops, as well as future meetings. Penn officials did not attend the last meeting, which occurred two weeks ago in New York City. Yale sophomore Jessica Champagne, who signed the letter on the New Haven, Conn., school's behalf, said the students would "like to be seen as full participants." "[Students] are the ones who brought this to the table, so we'd like to be part of the discussions," said Champagne, who is also the co-coordinator of Yale's chapter of Students Against Sweatshops. Second is a request for "genuinely independent monitors" who can fairly inspect the manufacturing sites without any "conflict of interest." In the letter, the students also demand a "living wage" for factory employees. According to the letter, many workers "struggle every day to barely subsist" on wages that are often below the poverty level. And finally, the letter calls for "public disclosure" of the exact addresses of every factory that produces official school-logo apparel. The administrations at Brown and Princeton universities have agreed to full public disclosure within the next year, a move that students say marks great progress in their movement. PAN also sent a more personal supplemental letter to Rodin. "I would like [Rodin] to agree to the four stipulations and I would like her to invite some student representatives to help come up with the language of a code that is appropriate for Penn and for the Ivy League as a whole," Joffe-Block said. The idea for the letter was conceived during a conference call between several Ivy student representatives approximately two weeks ago, according to Joffe-Block. E-mail messages were exchanged and finally the letter -- recently sent to each Ivy League school except Dartmouth -- was drafted. Now that an official response date has been set, students are hoping to see "some kind of public response," Champagne said.