Members of Students for Economic Justice, a campus group devoted to battling for improved labor conditions in factories overseas, will paint the rock on Farm Lane tonight in an effort to spread knowledge about the anti-sweatshop movement.

Adam Szlachetka, an SEJ member, said the rock painting goes hand-in-hand with the group’s efforts to get MSU into the Worker Rights Consortium, a labor monitoring organization that several universities, including the University of Michigan, belong to.

“We’re continuing talking with administrators about that,” Szlachetka said.

The group has also been gathering petitions from students all semester and will do more work on campus Thursday morning.

MSU is a member of the Fair Labor Association, an organization that has been criticized for not working hard enough to ensure fair labor conditions for overseas workers.

The recent SEJ initiatives come on the heels of a student protest Thursday at the University of Arizona in Tucson. Six students and two community members were arrested when they blocked access to the university’s Demonstration Building by locking themselves to the doors. The students were protesting the university president’s decision to remain in the FLA.

“This shows how important an issue this is,” Szlachetka said. “We support the struggle for workers’ rights.”

In support of the University of Arizona students’ efforts, Szlachetka and other SEJ members plan to contact Arizona President Peter Likins to request that he address student concerns.

The Arizona students remained chained to the building for eight hours before they were arrested and charged with misdemeanors, said Shamini Jain, a member of United Students Against Sweatshops and a student at the University of Arizona.

In 1999, the student group held a 10-day sit-in to protest the university’s decision to join the FLA.

Since then, despite talks with administrators, the relationship between the two groups has been strained, Jain said. In response to student concerns, the university joined the Worker Rights Consortium this summer. But Jain said the membership is in name only - designed to quiet student concerns.

“We’re basically not members of the WRC,” she said. “We’re putting all the effort into the FLA.”

When the president announced publicly in October his commitment to join the consortium, the group decided to take action, insisting the decision was simply a publicity stunt.

All workers in the university’s administration building were sent home because the group had chained themselves to all but one door.

Likins said he was shocked by Thursday’s events. The University of Arizona was one of the first to join the FLA, in 1999.

“I was disappointed,” he said in a phone interview Tuesday. “We were in continuous conversation just two days before this action talking about ways we could work together.”

Likins said it’s too soon to say if the administration will continue to work with students. He maintains his university will continue to work with both the labor monitoring groups.

“I feel very good about what we’ve accomplished in the FLA,” he said. “It’s a slow, hard process, but I really believe we are making progress.”

The Worker Rights Consortium, started by students and human rights activists, keeps factory officials out of decision-making regarding labor conditions.

The FLA, criticized for lack of factory disclosure, is made up of factory officials who ultimately determine what conditions are fair.

Sam Brown, the executive director of the FLA, called the students’ actions in Arizona a diversion to the real task of stopping sweatshops.

“None of these little petty arguments have any impact on the people who are in the intolerable sweatshops and it’s frankly kind of a waste of time,” he said. “This is angels dancing on the head of a pin.”

Brown acknowledged that the association has not begun monitoring companies yet, but said officials will soon, and they have established a code of conduct.

University of Arizona students should look at what the association has done so far, Brown said.

“They were just angry, just generally mad at the president and the university,” he said. “A large part of their complaint is about globalism and that we can’t fight. What we can do is help the conditions of people who work in the global market.”

Although nothing as drastic is planned at MSU, dialogue remains open between students and administrators, university spokesman Terry Denbow said. Denbow said while he hadn’t heard about events in Tucson, he recognizes the seriousness of the issue.

“We’re working with the FLA and we’re listening to all parties as we go,” he said. “There are a lot of important voices out there that we should all listen to and we’re making progress.”

Earlier this year, students held mild protests and rallies calling on MSU officials to abandon the association in favor of the Worker Rights Consortium. While President M. Peter McPherson has acknowledged there are flaws with the FLA, he’s not ready to ditch it.

Although the university has no plans to withdraw from the organization, Denbow said work can be done to make improvements.

“I think it is a vehicle for progress, but that doesn’t preclude ideas from others as well and believe me, Michigan State’s voice is being heard within the FLA,” Denbow said.

Pamela E. Spencer can be reached at spencerp@msu.edu.