U.S. College Students Team Up to Challenge Nike About Access to Factories

NIKE UNDER FIRE: Students at dozens of universities are banding together with the help of United Students Against Sweatshops to rally against Nike for allegedly refusing unrestricted access for the Worker Rights Consortium. With 180-plus U.S. university affiliates in the U.S. and Canada, the labor rights watchdog is championing undergraduates in a social media and take-action campaign with the end goal being investigations into complaints filed by workers in factories where Nike sources its college logo apparel. Giving the WRC full access to the factories where the brand produces its apparel is a rule “that is part of almost every university’s labor code of conduct, and is a condition for doing business with those universities,” a USAS spokesman said. A Nike spokesman did not respond immediately to a request for comment. The USAS spokesman also claimed Wednesday that Nike started its reversal on WRC access more than a year ago. In addition to an online campaign, sit-ins are being planned at select college campuses throughout the spring, he said. Georgetown recently dropped its bookstore contract with Nike, and Rutgers University did the same, the USAS spokesman said. Students at the University of Washington, the University of Texas at Austin, Purdue, the University of Alabama,

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