ORGANIZING YOUTH (OY!)
invites you to

Workers' Struggles: Voices from the Community
A Panel Discussion

When: Thursday Aug 11,  7.00pm to 8.30pm
Where: Center for Political Education, 522 Valencia St., San Francisco

The panel is free and open to all.

Come explore:
  • what various workers' rights struggles and campaigns have achieved
  • how multiple challenges of class and immigrant status affect workers
  • why building alliances amongst all workers is critical today

Panelists:
  • Monadel Herzallah has been working to improve the social, political, and employment conditions of the Middle Eastern, Muslim and South Asian communities for the past 19 years.  Currently, Mr. Herzallah works as a Political and Community Coordinator in Northern California for the Service Employee International Union (SEIU) Local 1877. Through the Arab American Union Members Council, he is also involved in grassroots networking with sister labor and community organizations. 

  • Sonya Mehta is an organizer with the Young Workers United.  She works with youth employed in the service industries.  Using popular education methods she facilitates workshops that talk about organizing strategies such as collective action to fight against unfair working conditions and wages and other problems faced by youth in these industries.

  • Raahi Reddy works for the UC Berkeley Labor Center, where she coordinates the Labor Center's leadership development programs with Bay Area trade unions, as well as the Labor Center’s campus outreach activities.  She is a veteran labor organizer and has worked for the Service Employees International Union for a decade, most recently serving as Organizing Director of SEIU Local 715 in San Jose. She has organized healthcare workers  in many states. Raahi also played a key role in the development of the Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance–AFL-CIO (APALA).  Through APALA, Raahi has also helped in international solidarity efforts with trade union movements in Asia.

  • Rhonda Ramiro is currently the chair of the Committee for Human Rights in the Philippines-Bay Area, CA, where her primary focus in on educating, organizing, and mobilizing people and communities to take progressive action in upholding and supporting human rights in the Philippines and throughout the world. She has been involved in campaigns to uphold immigrant rights, obtain justice for airport screeners, and end U.S. intervention in the Philippines.
This panel is being presented as part of OY! Summer 2005 . It is a free event and open to all. The  Organizing Youth (OY!) Collective aims  to facilitate the self-empowerment of youth from the South Asian diaspora  to organize for political, social, economic and environmental justice.

Supported in part by the Vanguard Public Foundation, the RESIST Foundation, and the Rainbow Grocery Cooperative.