With the ultimate goal of empowering workers in the UAE, the Labor Line Project is an initiative that translates labor law rights into the first languages of staff on campus.
The Labor Line Project
With the ultimate goal of empowering workers in the UAE, the Labor Line Project is an initiative that translates labor law rights into the first ...
Dec 5, 2015
With the ultimate goal of empowering workers in the UAE, the Labor Line Project is an initiative that translates labor law rights into the first languages of staff on campus.
Junior Annalisa Galgano, senior Geo Kamus and Ted Bongiovanni, a former NYU Abu Dhabi staff member, have played key roles in bringing together a team of interested people to work on the project.
The Labor Line Project arose from the need to ensure that workers are aware of their rights while they are in the UAE. The country has labor laws in place to provide protection to workers, and the Labor Line Project aims to ensure that these rights can be understood and invoked efficiently.
The project is currently headed by Galgano, who emphasized that she was not the initiative's founder.
The Labor Line now takes the form of a phone number, which can be reached by anyone in the UAE.
“When laborers arrive in the UAE, they are given a contract in either English or Arabic, but maybe not their native language,” said Galgano. “Our goal is to allow the workers to access the labor laws in their own languages, and instead of having a physical mp3 device which would read the rights we proposed to have a toll free number they could call.”
"Our goal is to be able to pass this to the government and have them either distribute it or take ownership of it," added Galgano.
There are several roles in the project: platform design, community outreach, research on the UAE legal system and translation of the laws and their changes.
Kamus first heard about the project through ADvocacy, the service organization at NYUAD. The project's idea was then brought to the Hackathon For Social Good in the Arab World, which took place on campus last spring.
The enthusiastic reception of the proposal among Hackathon audience members inspired confidence in the burgeoning project, which was soon garnering interest beyond NYUAD. According to Galgano, the project has since been recognized by the Ministry of Labor, as well as the International Labor Organization.
Initially, the Labor Line Project had relied on student translators to finalize the laws in other languages.
Now Kamus works through the Society of Global Development, a new Student Interest Group at NYUAD, to connect the project with possible corporate sponsors.
"The student translations are being used as a pilot, once we get approval from the corporate sponsors and the Ministry we’ll use the official translations," said Kamus.
Bongiovanni, who had been helping spread awareness of the project, felt encouraged by the active student interest he encountered.
"I was really impressed by how committed students from diverse backgrounds are to taking care of the people that did work in the UAE," he said. "Whether it’s students at NYUAD or outside, there’s a real sense that they are interested in exploring innovative solutions."
"It reaffirms the sense of humanity in the world. It was a great project to have been a part of while I was at NYUAD," he added.
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