Swarthmore College Challenges Anti-Discrimination Policy at Lockheed Martin
For First Time Since Anti-Apartheid MovementA College Using Stockholder Status to Advocate Social Change
Swarthmore College is using its position as a Lockheed Martin shareholder to urge the company to bar discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation in its equal employment opportunity policy. A resolution filed by the College has been published in the company's proxy ballot and will be voted on until the annual shareholders meeting in San Diego on April 25.
This resolution -- the first in the country solely initiated by a college or university since the anti-apartheid movement in the 1980s* -- is the work of the College's Committee for Socially Responsible Investing. The four-year-old committee is chaired by Harvard University Business School faculty member Samuel L. Hayes '57 and comprised of students, college administrators, and members of Swarthmore's Board of Managers. It prepared the resolution in consultation with the Equality Project, a non-profit organization in New York devoted to securing equality in the workplace for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered employees.
"Supporting this proposal is both socially and economically sound," says Morgan Simon '04, an Honors economics major and a member of the committee who will represent Swarthmore at the April meeting. "It's surprising that more colleges don't use their positions as stockholders in this way. It's not that difficult, and they all have the power to do it."
To file a resolution, a shareholder must have $2,000 or more invested in the company and must have held it for at least a year. Lockheed Martin is only one of the many companies in which Swarthmore holds stock [at $950 million as of June 30, 2001, Swarthmore's endowment was the 36th largest in the country], but Simon says it was chosen because of the potentially large impact of a policy change at such a prominent firm.
"Over half of the other Fortune 500 companies and many of Lockheed Martin's competitors, such as Boeing, Honeywell International, and Raytheon, already have such a policy in place," Simon says. "A shareholder resolution is the strongest statement a stockholder can make. We hope that our actions will not only lead to change at Lockheed Martin, but will also exert pressure on other Fortune 500 companies to update their policies and encourage colleges to use their power as shareholders for social good in the future."
For more information, please contact Vice President for Finance and Planning Paul Aslanian at (610) 328-8316.
Located near Philadelphia, Swarthmore is a highly selective liberal arts college with an enrollment of 1,450. Swarthmore is consistently ranked among the top liberal arts colleges in the country.
* according to Carolyn Mathiasen at the Investor Responsibility Research Center, 202-833-0700
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