May
23
UPDATE:
- Columbus Dispatch: “Nine arrested at Ohio State protest”
- The Lantern: “OSU Police arrest 9 protesters outside Gee’s office”
- ABC TV 6: “Protest Outside OSU Prez’ Office”
- AP: “9 arrested at Ohio State during protest against food service company, face trespassing charge”
- Video from inside the sit-in: Terasia Bradford speaks out | Just before student arrests | Cops take away arrested students
Remember when millionaire OSU President Gordon Gee told Carina Mieses “her problems” with “human rights issues” are “not my problem”? (Still unbelievable, isn’t it?) Today Gee’s denial of responsibility escalated into an outright crack down on free speech, when he ordered the arrest of 9 students peacefully staging a sit-in at his office.
Take action: Email President Gee now.
USAS | united students against sweatshops
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – May 23, 2011
Contact: Nick Pasquarello, OSU junior, 610-955-7388
Natalie Yoon, OSU sophomore, 614-425-9272
80 OSU Students Sit-In at Gee’s Office, Risk Arrest to Protest $100M Contract with Controversial France-Based Outsourcing Giant
Campus Outrage Boils Over as OSU Misses Student Coalition’s Deadline to End Contract with Sodexo over Abuse of OSU Stadium Workers
Western Washington U. Drops Sodexo, U. of Washington and Emory U. Arrest Dozens of Student Protestors Following Recent Exposés of Sodexo’s Human Rights Violations in 5 Countries
COLUMBUS, OH — At 3:00pm, after two years of campaigning, at least 80 Ohio State University students occupied the office of Gordon Gee — the highest-paid public university president in the nation — and are refusing to leave until OSU severs its 15-year deal deal with the global outsourcing giant Sodexo for concessions at athletics facilities, worth well over $100 Million in revenues. The sit-in immediately followed a rally with more than 100 students and Columbus NAACP President Noel Williams on OSU’s Quadrangle. Students are outraged and willing to risk arrest after Gee denied responsibility for severe mistreatment of Sodexo’s workers at OSU stadiums and around the world.
This school year, at least five independent sources — including Human Rights Watch — have reported Sodexo has violated its employees’ human rights in the United States, the Dominican Republic, Colombia and at least two other countries. At the same time, Sodexo workers at OSU stadiums have spoken out about their own mistreatment, reporting sub-poverty wages, sexual harassment, racism in hirings and promotions, a dangerously inadequate sick leave policy and other sweatshop-like conditions.
Since students’ campaign began in 2009, a broad coalition of student organizations, faculty and community leaders have joined OSU United Students Against Sweatshops in demanding Gee immediately terminate the contract with Sodexo, which would give 120 days for the controversial company to clear out and for OSU to bring in a new provider.
True to his reputation, Gee has made a number of unseemly and embarrassing statements. When Sodexo worker Carina Mieses traveled from the Dominican Republic to speak about documented human rights violations of which she was a victim, students caught Gee on camera saying to Mieses’ face, “her problems are not my problem.” When OSU stadium workers told Gee about their mistreatment, Gee told these workers to “just get another job.”
Last week Western Washington University ended its 50-year relationship with Sodexo in the wake of escalating student protests against the company’s labor rights record. As heralded on the front page of the Lantern reported this morning, OSU students hope Western Washington’s decision will spur on a similar decision by Gee. Last month, Northeastern University in Boston rejected a bid by Sodexo to takeover dining services after students protested Sodexo’s labor practices, and in January, Pomona College in California terminated its contract with Sodexo motivated in part by workers rights protests.
At over thirty college campuses across the country, students are taking action to kick out Sodexo until the company stops sub-poverty wages and stops firing, threatening and intimidating workers who try to speak out. In the last month alone, University of Washington has arrested 40 students and Emory University in Atlanta arrested 7 students after peaceful student sit-ins on both campuses to kick out Sodexo.
Students from as far as Georgia, have come to Ohio to join today’s protests, believing that Ohio State — as the largest university in the nation — has the power and responsibility to be a leader on holding contractors accountable to ethical practices and human rights. A group from Emory University explained how Sodexo workers in their school’s cafeterias are also speaking up about sub-poverty wages, disrespect, and intimidation for workers who speak up.
Students have been forced to take this dramatic action after two school-years of meetings, investigations, petitions, rallies, public forums with Sodexo workers and a bureaucratic run-around from university administrators. The student coalition issued a May 20 deadline in the hopes of spurring forward action by Gee, and see his failure to act by that date as the last straw.
“After nearly 2 years, this campaign has reached a breaking point,” said Natalie Yoon, OSU sophomore curretly sitting-in at Gee’s office. “Sodexo workers can’t wait and students can’t wait. We gave our administrators a deadline that they refused to meet but it’s clear the administration is not taking this issue as seriously as they should be.”
If President Gee does not decide to end OSU’s contract with the controversial human rights violator, Sodexo, another group of students will protest at at a meet-and-greet with President Gordon Gee in the Ohio Union, Round Meeting Room (third floor) at 5:30 PM.
United Students Against Sweatshops, formed by college students in 1997, is the independent, entirely student-run national organization dedicated to protecting the rights of workers on our campuses, workers sewing our college apparel, and workers in our communities.
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