Created in 2000, the Oberlin Office of the Ombudsperson's central role is to help improve the quality of on-campus discourse by providing individuals, primarily students, with the tools to resolve conflicts, solve problems, and communicate more effectively.

The ombudsperson assists with a wide range of concerns. Issues commonly dealt with include:

• Interpersonal conflicts
• Housing and dining issues
• Financial concerns
• Roommate concerns
• Faculty/staff/student misunderstandings
• Unethical behavior
• Fear of retaliation
• Interpersonal miscommunication
• Unfair treatment

The ombudsperson also oversees the Oberlin College Dialogue Center or OCDC, which promotes social change through conflict transformation, mediation, community building, and dialogue. The ethnically diverse mediation team for the center includes students, faculty, and staff who are trained to facilitate conflict mediation and resolution. The team also sponsors educational forums, workshops, and mediation training for student groups, administrative offices, and faculty groups.

Oberlin was on the vanguard of the mediation movement, and at the OCDC's inception, was one of only six institutions using a cutting-edge theory of mediation that incorporates the philosophy and theory of social justice. Based on the idea of personal narrative, or storytelling, this model was developed over the last decade by Leah Wing '84.

Learn more about the OCDC and the Office of the Ombudsperson.