Washington State Governors Office of the Education Ombuds

OEO is an independent state agency that helps to reduce educational opportunity gaps by supporting families, students, educators, and other stakeholders in communities across WA by sharing information about the K-12 public school system and resolving concerns collaboratively. OEO services are free and confidential. Anyone can contact OEO with a question or concern about school.

OEO listens, shares information and referrals, and works informally with families, communities, and schools to address concerns so that every student can fully participate and thrive in our state’s public schools. OEO provides support in multiple languages and has telephone interpretation available. To get help or learn more about what OEO does, please visit our website: https://www.oeo.wa.gov/en; email oeoinfo@gov.wa.gov, or call: 1-866-297-2597 (interpretation available).

OEO has many publications available on the OEO webpage, https://www.oeo.wa.gov/en/about-us/publications-and-resources-families, including new flyers in the following languages: Amharic, Arabic, Chinese Simplified, Dari, French, Hindi, Khmer, Korean, Marshallese, Punjabi, Russian, Samoan, Somali, Spanish, Tagalog, Tigrinya, Ukrainian, and Vietnamese.

In 2006, the Washington State Legislature passed House Bill 3127 to establish the Office of the Education Ombuds (OEO) to reduce the opportunity gap by supporting families, students, educators, and communities in understanding the public K-12 education system and resolving concerns collaboratively. The legislature placed us within the Governor’s Office to ensure our independence from the public education system.

We value our independence, anti-racist values, and responsiveness to communities. We will learn as a team from families, students, and communities and promote this vision.

We have limited resources and prioritize our direct Ombuds support to issues that fall within our strategic plan and where we can have a positive impact as collaborative problem-solvers on the student's experience. OEO works statewide with a small staff of less than 7 full-time employees.

OUR ROLES

• Listen to concerns and address questions about the K-12 public education system

• Use informal conflict resolution tools to support collaborative problem-solving and promote education justice

• Provide coaching, facilitation, and training about family and community engagement and systems advocacy

• Collect data and identify trends to guide our education policy recommendations