Stories

Sophomore leads by example through her advocacy work on campus

SCU political science major Abigail Alvarez spent her sophomore year advocating on behalf of service and auxiliary workers on campus. In addition to serving as a class senator and a Political Science Department peer advisor, Alvarez leads Advocacy for Workers on Campus (AWC), a labor rights group that mobilizes students in support of just labor practices. 

Alvarez was born and raised in Portland, Oregon and has been an advocate and activist for justice for most of her life. In high school, she focused on disability rights and education policy reform, but the campus climate in recent years has caused her to shift her focus to labor and immigrant rights. AWC started in 2019 with a group of five students who had built close relationships with SCU cafeteria workers and wanted to see change. Workers talked about feeling disrespected and unappreciated at work, as well as their constant fight for better wages. Alvarez and the other four wanted to use their power as students to make a difference. Now, AWC is an official program of the university’s Santa Clara Community Action Program (SCCAP), which houses 20 social justice groups on campus.

As a first-year student, Alvarez discovered several volunteer opportunities through SCCAP; she was a Special Olympics track & field coach, and she taught classes at the Day Workers Center of Mountain View. Now, Alvarez is the Program Coordinator of AWC and has her own team to organize and mobilize.

Alvarez says, “My goal is to listen to the needs of workers and shape the program accordingly. The workers at SCU are some of the kindest, most selfless members of our community, and at minimum, deserve the fair working conditions that AWC is advocating for on their behalf.”

Last year, AWC worked alongside Benson Cafeteria workers to protect their living wage. This year, the student-led group focused on addressing the tensions between Bon Appetit managers and workers.

AWC is most known for the campus-wide one day boycott of the school’s dining services company that it organized this past fall. However, it does so much more. Alvarez meets regularly with workers, company managers, and SCU administrators about the issues on campus. She leads 10 labor rights teach-ins every school year and organizes worker appreciation events across campus. She helps translate for workers whose primary language is Spanish and collaborates with their union. 

After SCU, Alvarez plans to run for office and/or start her own nonprofit that centers on the intersections between various forms of social oppression. Classes like “Women in Politics” have inspired her to connect her passion for justice with political ambition. Her political science professors encouraged her to take an internship in Washington DC last summer, and advocate on the national level. She feels that her experiences at SCU, and especially her work leading AWC, have equipped her to be a lifelong leader and advocate for justice.

Santa Clara's Community Action Program (SCCAP) is a chartered student organization that promotes the holistic education of the volunteer by serving the surrounding community and by reflecting upon social justice issues, with the intent of challenging the participants to commit to creating a more humane and just world. To find out more about their programs, including Advocacy for Workers on Campus (AWC), please visit their website.