From

Service Matters 1998: Engaging Higher Education In the Renewal of America s Communities and American Democracy

From Service Matters 1998: Engaging Higher Education In the Renewal of America s Communities and American Democracy

Web site: http://ccts2.cti.depaul.edu/whpdc/index.htm

Contact: William Howard, Executive Director, williamhoward {at} aol(.)com

From Service Matters 1998: Engaging Higher Education In the Renewal of America s Communities and American Democracy

web site: http://www.iupui.edu/~floc/home.html

e-mail: floc {at} topaz.iupui(.)edu

From Service Matters 1998: Engaging Higher Education In the Renewal of America s Communities and American Democracy

Contact: Community Service Director Dr. Mark Levine at Mark_Levine {at} uml(.)edu

We followed that panel with a day devoted to racism and diversity on October 4, 1999. Featured speakers were Dr. Bertice Berry (Fox TV), Robert Lewis Jr. (City Year in Boston), community leaders, faculty, and students. A discussion of feelings, questions, and solutions followed. This panel preceded the beginning of a Study Circles Program in the city.

This March, various departments and offices sponsored the speaking engagement of Judy Shepard, mother of slain gay student Mathew Shepard. An overflow audience of town and college individuals attended.

In summation the campus has developed a promising practice that has gone beyond the boundaries of the college, into the community to make the issue of hate crime and intolerance one that can be openly discussed. The Boston Globe has agreed to assist us in locating more speakers for future programs.

Website: http://raven.fsc.edu/studentaff/index.html

From Service Matters 1998: Engaging Higher Education In the Renewal of America s Communities and American Democracy

Website: http://ecampus.bentley.edu/dept/bslc/new/03/05/main.htm

The above is one of several intergenerational programs featured in the Constitutional Rights Foundation Network magazine, Winter 2001. Written by Wendy Schaetzel Lesko

From Service Matters 1998: Engaging Higher Education In the Renewal of America s Communities and American Democracy

From Service Matters 1998: Engaging Higher Education In the Renewal of America s Communities and American Democracy

Contact:
UNC School of Law
Van Hecke-Wettach Hall,
100 Ridge Road
CB #3380
Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3380
(919) 962-5106

Social Advocacy
Students at UVM have formed the UVM Coalition for Responsible Investment to promote social advocacy for human rights and to provide a vehicle for students to make their concerns known to the campus community and to the administration. Recently, the Coalition took up the issue of sweatshop labor and did research on the development of an appropriate code of conduct for apparel manufacturers that are licensed by the university to utilize UVM trademarks. In April they launched a campaign to make UVM “”sweatshop free.”" In doing this, they first followed a fairly traditional course of holding a press conference on the steps of the administration building and circulating petitions calling for the administration to adopt a strict code of conduct and establish its own monitoring process for ensuring compliance among its licensees. In their initial communication they presented their work as a long-term campaign that would require “”long term commitments, discipline and focus.”" They expressed the hope that protests, demonstrations and sit-ins would not be necessary to get the attention of the administration and to promote their cause.

Choosing to use this naturally developing interest as a means to promote a more comprehensive approach to advocacy, members of the student affairs staff met with the leadership of the Coalition to discuss the practical and ethical dilemmas posed by the issue of “”sweatshop labor.”" The staff also worked with the Student Government Association to open up opportunities for a broader discussion of the issues as well as an exploration of ethically sound strategies that would be appropriate for an institution like UVM with its values of respect, integrity, innovation, openness, justice and responsibility.

UVM s involvement with licensing agreements is somewhat different from those of the larger and more nationally prominent members of the newly-formed Fair Labor Association and the recently established coalition working with PriceWaterhouseCoopers to design a monitoring system that would be more clearly independent of influence by apparel manufacturers. UVM enters into contracts with over 150 firms, including many small Vermont-based firms, to produce a range of items with UVM trademarks and logos. The total revenue from these licenses is approximately $50,000. At this scale, the package originally advocated by the Coalition—which called for a very strict code of conduct including the requirement that manufacturers pay a “”living wage”" and for UVM to establish and operate its own compliance reviews—was clearly not feasible. After much discussion, the students amended their request of the administration to propose that an advisory task force of students faculty and staff be formed to discuss how the university could best address labor and human rights issues and to gather evidence needed to make a rational and well-thought-out decision. This group has now been formed and has begun to explore our options.

The lessons to be learned from this experience as well as the environmental advocacy of CEL is that it is possible to leverage the genuine interest and concern of students about issues of human rights or the environment or other social issues to create an opportunity to introduce new approaches to constructive and effective action within our current organizations and public systems. Drawing on the concepts of problem-based learning and experiential learning, a meaningful engagement with student concerns can create a wonderful avenue for promoting civic responsibility and for involving students in constructive institutional change.

Website: http://www.uvm.edu/~uvmsga/indexreg.htm