Verité Worker Education and Community Enterprise Programs
In conducting audits and research around the world, Verité has identified a wide range of needs for practical training and education among workers and working communities. During the tens of thousands of worker interviews Verité has performed over the years, it is often clear that workers are not aware of their rights under local and/or national labor law, particularly with regard to legal limits on work hours and how wages are calculated. Workers also lack job skills, financial literacy, life skills, basic and “job advancement” education, and computer literacy. Because of this lack of knowledge and access to resources, workers are often prone to victimization by factory management and are unable to pursue whatever legal remedies exist, and to realize their aspirations for economic self-sufficiency and well-being. In response to the need for worker education and workplace community programs, Verité offers a variety of programs. Such initiatives are supported by companies and corporate foundations to leverage their economic strength and networks, and philanthropic and governmental institutions with leadership on issues ranging from women’s rights, economic development, social responsibility, and workplace issues.
Through the implementation of these worker education and community enterprise programs, we aim for positive social change in workplaces globally, and improvements in communities where factories and brands operate. We hope for the empowerment of workers and their families to achieve greater economic and social opportunities.
Examples of Verité’s programs:
Basic Skills
Verité has conducted education initiatives for factory workers in partnership with local NGOs directly reaching over 80,000 workers. Our labor rights, job and life skills training has been provided for workers in places such as China, Bangladesh, India, Vietnam, Mexico, El Salvador, and Honduras. A larger percentage of the participants are young women, many migrants, living in poverty, disempowered and at high risk of contracting infectious diseases including HIV/AIDS. We have established an independent Verité Workplace Center, Worker Training Center in Shenzhen, China to provide access for workers whose employers do not participate in factory-based programs. The Workplace Center also coordinates trainings for factory managers. The Center presents payroll training (accurate wage calculation and payroll record keeping) to representatives from factories and continues to expand, including personnel policies, working hours and overtime policy for factories. Verité also runs Mobile Van and Advancing Women Programs that deliver tools and education, covering labor and human rights, women’s, health & safety, financial literacy, and CSR issues, to factories.
Labor Law Training
Our Labor Law training, pioneered in China, is designed to ensure that workers, most of whom have completed high school, have a complete understanding of relevant labor law, including legal work hours and overtime premium payment regulation, and understand how their wages are calculated. The program has already been implemented in 13 factories. Courses offered, based on worker needs and community assessments, include a range of topics, including computers, reproductive health, English language, dressmaking and other skills such as micro-enterprise, needed for workers to establish small businesses when they return to their home towns.Issue Specific Training
On behalf of client companies, Verité conducts training programs on issues such as sexual harassment and abuse, women's health, communications, and other supervisory issues. These programs are implemented in such diverse places as India, Bangladesh, Turkey, China and Puerto Rico. These programs improve working conditions, education workers and management, help to build internal structures and capability to achieve company goals, and improve social and environmental performance.
All trainings are custom designed and conducted by seasoned professionals drawn from Verité's network of local experts and NGOs with experience in the issues and business functions being targeted. Many times, in addition to workers, factory management and brands are participants in the program to ensure sustainable change in the workplace. Peer education is incorporated into programs, where possible, to ensure that learning among workers can continue even after the program is completed.
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