Furman University rejoins Fair Labor Association

Furman’s entry into the Fair Labor Association makes it official: That T-shirt with the Furman logo at the bookstore wasn’t made by a child. It wasn’t made by a woman earning less than a man simply because of her gender. And it wasn’t created in a factory with conditions that threaten the health, well-being or lives of the people working there.

The FLA is an organization that works with businesses, organizations, and colleges and universities to advance workers’ rights and improve working conditions throughout the global supply chain by meeting international standards. With Furman’s FLA membership in July, the university joined about 140 academic institutions in North America, according to the organization’s website.

In Spring 2022, students of Geoffrey Habron, a professor of sustainability science at Furman, were learning about material sourcing, socially just practices within the supply chain, and other aspects of manufacturing. They then researched organizations that track such information, such as the FLA.

At the same time, Furman was examining its own policies for corporate partnerships and licensing.

“An amazing collaboration developed that gave our students real-world experience and ultimately had a direct impact on the university’s decisions,” said Elizabeth Lichtenberg, senior director of brand strategy and visual communications. “It’s important for Furman to be a leader in socially just practices and great for our students to help shape the direction of the university. They made this happen.”

The students discussed licensing, purchasing and other considerations with four groups across campus: Auxiliary Services, The Shi Institute for Sustainable Communities, Furman Athletics and University Communications. After meeting with the FLA and studying the benefits of membership, Habron’s class presented its recommendation to Furman leadership – that the university rejoin the FLA – and their recommendation was approved. Furman had last been a member in 2016.

“The ultimate goal was to have Furman join the FLA again, but it was also for students to help contribute to these decisions,” said Elizabeth Santi ’23, one of the students involved in the project.

With its membership, Furman has access to a Fair Factories Clearinghouse platform, where collegiate licensees that supply the university with their products will register the location of the sites where their products are made. This makes it possible to track the conditions and any reports of labor violations in those factories.

“This enables us really to be consistent, not just that you learned it in my class or another class or there’s a major,” Habron said. “Here’s a clear indication that Furman practices what we preach. That will be great for the outside world, for prospective students.”

In the course of their research, the students concluded that FLA membership serves as a “floor” for standards, and that a more comprehensive look at the supply chain would be warranted, because FLA does not differentiate levels within approved companies or products. For instance, said Habron, while Nike and Adidas are both FLA members, one is much more stringent and transparent.

“So, we hope that FLA membership begins the conversation to spur us to do more,” he said.

Since rejoining the FLA in July, any changes inside the Furman bookstore are unlikely to attract notice.

“There might be some (products) that go away, but the big ones when people walk in – Nike, Under Armour, Russell Athletic – they have enough money to pay and make sure they’re part of the FLA,” he said. Part of the research students were doing involved finding out many people would be impacted by Furman’s membership. “It’s more the smaller companies,” Habron said. “Because this requires them to audit where their materials come from and do the record keeping that comes along with it.”

He pointed to parallels in organic food certification. While a small farmer might not use pesticides, the time and expense to get certified as an organic farm may be prohibitive.

“How are we going to help these companies become part of FLA? It’s not a panacea,” Habron said. “This just starts the conversation. You don’t want to exclude the small (businesses). That’s not sustainable either.”

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