Adopt the DSP! UNC Sweatfree Now!

Students are peacefully occupying South Building (near Chancellor Moeser's office) in a sit-in to demand he adopt the DSP after three years of stalling. Please sign this petition to urge him to sign onto the students' demands and to refrain from taking disciplinary action against them, academic, legal or otherwise!

To:  UNC-CH Chancellor James Moeser and UNC System President Erskine Bowles

We support the basic human rights of workers at all levels of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, including the right to organize and to be paid a living wage. We request that you respect these rights by publically endorsing the Designated Suppliers Program (DSP), which would enforce UNC's existing labor codes of conduct in the factories that manufacture UNC's licensed apparel. After a favorable business review letter is received from the Department of Justice, we further request that UNC-CH immediately take steps to implement the DSP as university policy.

The Designated Suppliers Program (DSP) was presented to the UNC-CH administration in Fall 2005 by Student Action with Workers, an affiliate of United Students Against Sweatshops. The DSP is a comprehensive program for enhancing the enforcement of university codes of conduct under which University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill apparel will be produced in designated sweatfree factories.

We, as students, faculty, staff, and members of the Carolina community would like to see our university act as a leader in the struggle to ensure that the rights of workers producing apparel for our university are respected. Our position as a top seller of collegiate apparel means that we should be setting ethical standards. As of now, forty-one major colleges and universities have distinguished themselves as leaders by adopting the DSP, including Duke University, the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Georgetown, and the entire University of California system. It is our expectation that, given our university’s stated commitment to worker rights, we will soon become the 42nd. We ask that you publicly endorse the DSP and to commit our university to adopting it as university policy.

Members of our sweatfree coalition request that you publicly endorse and adopt the Designated Suppliers Program as university policy no later than the close of the business day on April 16, 2008, after the last meeting of your Licensing Labor Code Advisory Committee on April 15 at 5 pm. We look forward to working together to ensure that UNC-CH becomes a leader in the struggle for human dignity.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Members of the Carolina Sweatfree Coalition include (Groups, organizations, and individuals that officially endorse the DSP as of April 9, 2008, though it is growing every day):

Graduate and Professional Student Federation (GPSF)
The Progressive Faculty Network (PFN)
Young Democrats (YD)
Carolina Hispanic Association (CHispA)
Feminist Students United (FSU)
Alianza
Students for a Democratic Society (SDS)
Middle East Student Forum (MESF)
Students Working in the Environment for Active Transformation (SWEAT)
Muslim Student Association (MSA)
Arab Student Organization (ASO)
Persian Cultural Society (PCS)
Solidarity with Palestine through Education and Action at Carolina (SPEAC)
Students United for a Responsible Global Environment (SURGE)
Campaign for a Safer Carolina
Technology without Borders (TWB)

Dr. Altha Cravey, Professor of Geography, Member of the Licensing Labor Advisory Committee
Dr. Omid Safi, Associate Professor of Religious Studies
Dr. Sherryl Kleinman, Professor of Sociology
Dennis Arnold, PhD Student in Geography, Member of the LLCAC, 2006-2007
Salma Mirza, Chancellor’s Carolina Scholar Class of 2008, Member of the LLCAC
Michael Hachey, Robertson Scholar Class of 2007, LLCAC member 2005-2006
Melanie Stratton, Class of 2007, Member of the LLCAC 2004-2007
David Brannigan, Vice-Chair of the UNC-CH Employee Forum
Steve Hutton, UNC-CH Department of Epidemiology

Sincerely,

The Undersigned

The Adopt the DSP! UNC Sweatfree Now! Petition to UNC-CH Chancellor James Moeser and UNC System President Erskine Bowles was created by UNC-CH Student Action with Workers and the Carolina Sweatfree Coalition and written by Salma Mirza (salma.m.mirza@gmail.com).  This petition is hosted here at www.PetitionOnline.com as a public service. There is no endorsement of this petition, express or implied, by Artifice, Inc. or our sponsors. For technical support please use our simple Petition Help form.