Stockton University Ombuds Office Annual Report FY 2025-26*

Stockton University seal Karen A. Reardon, PhD, JD

Introduction

This annual report covers the FY 2025/26 during which the Ombuds Office was staffed by one 50 % part-time Ombuds Officer. This report details 12 full months of activity.

The Ombuds Office plays an important role for employees who seek a safe place to speak freely about concerns and challenges as members of the University community. In response, I share office protocols and work to understand the circumstances that occasioned their outreach. We explore options to address their concerns through information gathering and coaching. I refer visitors to university policies and internal resources, and, when appropriate, to external resources. A key strategy employed is to serve as a neutral intermediary or facilitator between and among parties who wish to discuss issues, concerns, and conflict. I sometimes act as a conduit between parties who are unable or unwilling to communicate directly using shuttle diplomacy. All interaction with the Ombuds Office is fully voluntary and discussions are confidential. No action is taken or communication made without a visitor’s permission. Table 1 elaborates on the nature of the services provided.

Table 1: Nature of Engagement
Type of Engagement	Engagement Description
Exploration of Options	Listen to visitor’s concerns and help identify resources, avenues and strategies for resolution and weigh relative merits of options.
Coaching	Provide visitor with possible approaches and methods for problem solving and conflict resolution; help visitor plan next steps; advise on framing, language, tone, etc.
Information Gathering	Reach out directly to Stockton resources to gather information pertinent to dispute resolution.
Referral to University Policy	Direct visitor to university policies, procedures, and practices.
Referral to Resource	Provide visitor with description of and contact information for potentially useful resources within or outside the University.
Mediation/Facilitated Conversation	Serve as neutral intermediary or facilitator for parties to discuss issues, concerns, conflicts, etc., upon mutual agreement.
Shuttle Diplomacy	Serve as conduit between parties who cannot or are not willing to communicate directly with each other.

Year in Review

I promptly acknowledge initial visitor outreach by email providing written guidelines for working with the Ombuds Office and seeking to schedule an appointment. Almost all visitors first reach out using email with a request for an in-person meeting though a few request to and do connect remotely through Zoom.

During FY 2025/26, the Ombuds Office opened 64 cases, hosted 100 visitor meetings, facilitated 3 group visitor mediations/conversations (each involving 6+ people) and communicated with visitors and involved parties over 231 email streams.

Non-faculty union staff accounted for the largest proportion of visitors, followed by non-union staff, then faculty, and finally, leadership (President's and Provosts' Offices, VPs, Deans). See Table 2.

Visitors to the office come from all divisions of the employee community. Table 3 shows the breakdown of visitors by affiliation to the University.

Table 2: Cases Initiated by Visitor Role FY 2025-2026*
Leadership	4.5%	3
Non Union Staff	37.5%	24
Union Staff	45.5%	30
Faculty	12.5%	8
		65

*In one instance, 2 visitors initiated a single case, thus 65 visitors initiated 64 cases.

I continue to introduce the Ombuds Office to incoming leadership and, upon request, deliver presentations to various university constituent groups on the structure and function of the Office of Ombuds. I continue to assess the operations and demand for the kinds of services provided by the office which now operates pursuant to a formal charter and guidelines which I developed and may be found on the Ombuds webpage. In association with the President’s Office, the Provost, and Video Production Services, I advanced work on the “Cultivating Dignity’ video series designed to educate the community about behaviors that align (and do not align) with the Ethic of Care to which President Bertolino has asked the community to aspire. In FY 25_26, we produced three additional episodes bringing the total to 6. Completed videos are hosted on the Ombuds Office webpage through the Continuing Education link.

Table 3: Cases By Affiliation of Initial Visitor 2025-26*
Arts and Humanities	0
Business	1
Education	1
Enrollment Management	16
Facilities and Operations	11
Administration and Finance	4
General Studies	2
Health Sciences	8
Natural Sciences and Mathematics	7
Academic Affairs	5
Social and Behavior Sciences	0
Student Affairs	4
University Advancement	3
IT	1
President's Office	2
Other or Unknown	2

The Ombuds Office records the nature of issues brought forward using broad categories employed by the greater ombuds community to facilitate comparisons over time. This year, the most frequent issues raised pertain to general employment-related issues (e.g., job performance or compatibility, discipline, or interpersonal issues, conflict, miscommunication, managing up and supervisory coaching, etc.) followed by cases involving general institutional issues with personal behavioral s (e.g., abusive, abrasive, and inappropriate conduct; discrimination; bullying, micromanagement) rounding out the top 3 category of cases. See Table 4.

Table 4: Issues Raised By Visitors
	Issue Category	Issue Definition	Frequency FY 2025-26*
Academic Related	Academic, General	General academic matters involving students or faculty.	2
	Academic Integrity	Honesty in academic pursuits, e.g., plagiarism, cheating, misrepresentation of academic records, fabrication, unfair advantage.	1
	Academic Procedures	Formal (explicit or implicit) policies, procedures, and practices that regulate academic pursuits, interests and tenure.	3
	Academic Standards	Matters relating to fairness and accuracy or rationales for academic standards of achievement.	1
	Academic Research	Research results, interpretations, explanations, and associated authorship and intellectual property rights.	0
Employment Related	Employment, General	Matters relating to job performance or compatibility, discipline, or interpersonal issues relating to role as an employee.	38
	Employment, Promotion	Career advancement to higher level; tenure.	5
	Employment, Compensation	Rate of pay, salary amount, equity, or competitiveness.	5
	Employment, Benefits	Rewards or compensation (other than wages and salary) associated with employment status and their equity, competiveness, or administration.	2
	Employment, Procedures	Formal (explicit or implicit) policies and practices that regulate the employment relationship.	5
Behavior	Abrasive/Abusive/ Inappropriate Behavior	Demonstration of inappropriate treatment of others, e.g., abusive, threatening, coercive behavior; rudeness, crudeness; acts or threats of violence.	9
	Sexual Harassment	Unwelcome physical, verbal, written, electronically transmitted, etc. conduct of a sexual nature that creates a hostile or intimidating environment.	1
	Discrimination	Disparate treatment tied to protected status (race, gender, age, national origin, religion, etc.)	6
Other	Procedures, General	General matters relating University policies, procedures, or practices.	5
	General Institutional Issues	Operational issues, hiring practices, organizational structure, leadership practices, health and safety	11
	Union Contract Interpretation	Time and Attendance, Reassignment, Reclassification.	6
	Miscellaneous	Outside Scope of Ombuds Office, Unknown/No Follow Up After Initial Outreach.	6
Total Issues			106

* Because visitors at times raise more than one issue, the total number of visitor issues is greater than the number of cases.

Observations and Recommendations

My analysis identified some consistent themes and trends:

Over time, the number of concerns brought to the Ombuds Office have decreased. I attribute this to working through the backlog of legacy concerns inherited after the office was not staffed for 18 months prior to the incumbent assuming responsibility for providing service as well as a reduced employee population.
Professional coaching and issues of career development within a dynamic higher education context now dominate over crisis intervention as new leadership has settled in and in the presence of consolidations and restructuring. There are fewer reports of microaggressions, bullying, and inappropriate behavior. It is essential for behavioral expectations to continue to be shared and modeled by leaders consistent with the aspirational culture of care and dignity leadership model. It would appear that efforts to infuse an Ethic of Care are beginning to take root and required manager training has communicated uniform expectations for conduct and accountability.

The Ombuds Office is located in L208. It can be reached by email at ombuds@stockton.edu. Please consult the webpage for more information about the office and its activities. I endeavor to respond to inquiries quickly and encourage anyone experiencing difficulties related to their work as a member of the Stockton community to contact the Ombuds Office. Consistent with best practice, all outreach is confidential except in matters involving child abuse, threat of imminent harm and violations of court order which the Ombuds Officer has a duty to report.

* This report was built on a template created by and liberally uses the language of University of Pennsylvania Ombuds Dr. Jennifer Pinto-Martin.

Report issued July 6, 2026.