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Starting a Campaign

Interested in starting a living wage campaign? Here are some resources to get you started!

Step 1: Talk to campus workers!

An effective student-worker solidarity campaign is based in strong relationships between workers and students. Students need to actively take direction from campus workers, who are most directly affected by living wage campaigns and similar struggles.

How do you find out what the main concerns and grievances are of workers at your school? How do you know whether workers are earning a living wage? Build relationships and ask them! Start by building trust, being careful to respect workers' space, beware of talking in front of managers, and listen to workers' stories more than you rant on about a living wage campaign.

For more info: Check out our workshops, the Campus Organizing Manual (and its table of contents) from United Students Against Sweatshops, and the "Organizing Kit" and "Living Wage Guide" at the website for the National Student Labor Week of Action (March 27 - April 4, 2006).

Join the national network: Once you've formed a student-worker solidarity group on your campus, consider becoming a chapter of the Student Labor Action Project and United Students Against Sweatshops.

Host an LWAC training at your school! LWAC facilitators (past and current campus activists) run trainings across the country for campus groups involved in living wage campaigns and similar struggles. Bring us to your campus!

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