Graduate Dispute Resolution
As conflict is part of our everyday, we often struggle finding resolutions and subsequently, relationships and work suffer. Further, as graduate students, we are in unique positions with stress, collegial relationships, and education/work that greatly impact our ability to communicate.
The aim of the UNM Ombuds Services is to provide graduate students, employees, and their coworkers with a neutral, third-party to assist in conflict resolution processes. Ombuds Services provides a space for graduate students to share their concerns, navigate difficult conversations, and manage conflict. Examples of issues that may affect students include conflict with advisors, department chairs, students from a class in which they serve as TA as well as conflicts with other graduate students, staff, or faculty members.
UNM Ombuds Services provides consultation and mediation services for graduate students stuck in conflicts with colleagues, staff, administrators, and/or faculty. This office attends to the notion that all conflicts and resolutions appear different for each individual. Thus consultation and mediation are methods that serve graduate students in a way that meets this diversity.
Ombuds Services abides by the “10A Standards of Practice” according to the International Ombudsman Association as well as HIPAA regulations. Within this practice, confidentiality becomes central to maintaining discretion. All conversations with the ombudsperson are kept confidential. If conflicts resort to mediation, a confidentiality agreement is signed by both parties indicating that no one beyond those in the mediation (ombudsperson(s), party 1, and party 2) are privy to the information that arises in the discussion.
For more questions about these service, visit Ombuds Services. To make an appointment, please email ombuds@unm.edu
Note: This office does not provide advocacy services as advocacy impedes any impartiality. Students in need of graduate student advocates should contact GPSA (505-277-3803 or gpsa@unm.edu).
