Sweatshop activists meet with Rodin

The students are hoping to convince Penn to abandon the Fair Labor Association. Discussing workers' rights, labor conditions and Penn-logo apparel, University President Judith Rodin sat at the negotiating table with the United Students Against Sweatshops yesterday. The meeting represented an important step forward for the student members of USAS, who have long been calling on Rodin to take stronger action in ensuring that school-logo products are not produced by sweatshop laborers. But Rodin did not promise to pull out of a controversial monitoring organization, as student activists had hoped. Yesterday's meeting was the second time in the past month that Rodin met face to face with the organization. She initially spoke with the group several hours after 14 students staged a sit-in in her College Hall office last month. University officials have promised to work with the students to develop a code of conduct regarding the University's licensing practices, including requiring all new makers of Penn apparel to disclose their factory locations and ensuring independent, impartial monitoring of the manufacturing sites. "I feel it is important for Penn to have a code of conduct, and we are now working with USAS to develop one," Rodin said yesterday. Specifically, USAS members again tried to convince Rodin that the University should leave the Fair Labor Association, a coalition of apparel companies, universities and human rights groups that currently monitors conditions at factories in developing nations. USAS members have criticized the FLA as biased and ineffective. They have been pressuring University officials into joining the Worker Rights Consortium, a new group of human-rights groups and students at various universities. Several students expressed disappointment after yesterday's meeting. "They are not going to pull out of the [FLA], especially not by February 1, which is the deadline we asked them to pull out by," said USAS member Anna Robert, a College freshman. University Associate General Counsel Eric Tilles, who was present at the meeting, said Penn is still supporting the FLA and "intend[s] to do so for the short-to-medium term." "I also feel it is important for Penn to continue to be part of the FLA, and we will continue to watch the development of the WRC with interest," Rodin said. "As time progresses, the University may consider joining the WRC as well." Still, students said the decision to develop a code of conduct was an appropriate concession on the part of the University, and several called it an acknowledgement that the Fair Labor Association is insufficient in fulfilling their needs. Tilles said that he will meet with USAS immediately after winter break to flesh out the terms of the code. The University also agreed to pay to send USAS members to conferences on workers' rights and sweatshop issues. "That's another concession," Roberts said. "The University is going to pay to have us go to conferences to stay better informed." However, several students said they were disappointed with a perceived lack of acknowledgement of the resolution recently passed by the Philadelphia City Council, which urged area universities to join the WRC. The resolution "was pretty much overlooked," Roberts said. "[Even though] every single City Council member signed on as a co-sponsor." The City Council resolution was one of the items presented by USAS to Rodin. Also presented were statements from the AFL-CIO supporting the students and copies of relevant press releases from the group.