Green Dot was born out of failure, that despite generations of hard work, there was little evidence that fewer people were getting hurt. Given the extraordinary cost of failing to prevent interpersonal violence, the program’s creator gave herself permission to let go of everything she thought she knew. She sought research from a variety of disciplines. The resulting Green Dot strategy is informed by concepts and lessons learned from bodies of research and theory across the domains of violence against women, social diffusion, bystander dynamics, perpetration, and marketing/advertising. The foundation of Green Dot is built upon the necessity of achieving a critical mass of individuals willing to engage in new behaviors. Therefore, the strategy strives to recognize and address anything within our efforts that might limit engagement, including historical obstacles in the field of violence prevention as well as professional and personal obstacles we all face. Finally, in contrast to historical approaches to violence prevention that have focused on victims and perpetrators, Green Dot is predicated on the belief that individual safety is a community responsibility. It shifts the lens away from victims and perpetrators and onto bystanders, with the overarching goal of mobilizing a force of engaged and proactive bystanders.

The Green Dot strategy is a comprehensive approach to violence prevention that capitalizes on the power of peer and cultural influence across all levels of the socio-ecological model. Informed by social change theory, the model targets all community members as potential bystanders, and seeks to engage them, through awareness, education, and skills practice, in proactive behaviors that establish intolerance of violence as the norm, as well as reactive interventions in high-risk situations – resulting in the ultimate reduction of violence. Specifically, the program targets socially influential individuals from across community subgroups. The goal is for these groups to engage in a basic education program that will equip them to integrate moments of prevention within existing relationships and daily activities. By doing so, new norms will be introduced and those within their sphere of influence will be significantly influenced to move from passive agreement that violence is wrong, to active intervention.

The Green Dot strategy is informed by the following bodies of research: bystander behaviors, diffusion of innovations, marketing/branding, perpetration, public health, and adult learning theories. Literature about violence against women suggests that years of sustained effort have not yet produced measurable reductions in violence. Green Dot applies the success of the field in building knowledge and awareness and successful prevention strategies from other disciplines. Research on bystander behaviors informs skill building to recognize and intervene safely and effectively in situations that are high risk for violence. Literature about perpetration clarifies what constitutes a potentially high-risk situation. Diffusion of innovations theory suggests that population-level behavior change can spread if enough influential opinion leaders adopt and endorse innovative behavior. Through this approach, Green Dot seeks to engage a critical mass of bystanders in violence prevention. Evidence suggests that community perceptions of the traditional brand of “violence against women” are negative; despite widespread connection to the issue, most people are not actively involved in prevention. Green Dot uses marketing research to create an inclusive brand, one that the majority of community members can align with. Lastly, Green Dot uses adult learning theories to ensure that its instructors demonstrate excellent communication and delivery.

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Green Dot complies with several VAWA requirements to educate students and employees on sexual violence. First, it is a primary prevention program that promotes awareness and prevention of dating/domestic violence, stalking, and sexual assault. The program defines these types of violence and provides safe and positive options for bystander intervention that individuals can take to prevent harm or intervene in risky situations. To strengthen the concepts and skills taught within the curricular components of the strategy, Green Dot uses social marketing and action events, which engage a broader populations in key prevention messages and taking preventative action.

The Green Dot Strategy specifically addresses prevention and not response or policy compliance. We have found the separation of response and prevention allows more people to align with the mission of prevention and contribute to a safer campus in actionable ways. We work with campuses to ensure their prevention and response programming are compatible and both create healthy, safe learning environments, but Green Dot’s focus is on prevention.

A CDC review of 140 studies (DeGue et al., 2014) and a review of evaluations conducted since the 2014 review shows that Green Dot is the only prevention approach that has been proven to reduce multiple forms of interpersonal violence. Four evaluations of Green Dot have been conducted with high school and college students and all found positive results: 1) Coker et al. (2011) Evaluation of Green Dot: An active bystander intervention to reduce sexual violence on college campuses. Violence Against Women. 2) Coker et al. (2014) Evaluation of the Green Dot bystander intervention to reduce interpersonal violence among college students across three campuses. Violence Against Women. 3) Coker et al. (2016) Bystander intervention evaluation for violence prevention. American Journal of Preventitive Medicine. 4) Coker et al. (in press) New England Journal of Medicine. Green Dot has been used in 300+ colleges, 50+ high schools and middle schools, 50+ communities, installations from all branches of the military, and is currently being implemented in four continents. Green Dot has been selected as the sole prevention strategy for sexual assault, stalking, and domestic violence for the United States Air Force.

Four evaluations of Green Dot have been conducted with high school and college students and all found positive results. The following peer-reviewed publications summarize results of the four evaluations: 1) Coker et al. (2011) Evaluation of Green Dot: An active bystander intervention to reduce sexual violence on college campuses. Violence Against Women. 2) Coker et al. (2014) Evaluation of the Green Dot bystander intervention to reduce interpersonal violence among college students across three campuses. Violence Against Women. 3) Coker et al. (2016) Bystander intervention evaluation for violence prevention. American Journal of Preventitive Medicine. 4) Coker et al. (in press) New England Journal of Medicine.

There are two training options to become certified to implement the Green Dot strategy: 1) Sending a team to one of our national 4- Day Green Dot Institutes. Cost for the national institutes (which includes breakfast, lunch, and snacks for four days plus materials) is between $1,075-$1,750 per participant depending on how early you register and the number of participants attending from your institution. Green Dot also provides scholarship funding for registration fees. 2) Hosting an onsite training where members of our Green Dot team come to organizations/communities/institutions. The advantage of onsite training is that it allows consumers to train as many staff as possible - creating a deep bench of instructors who can be a part of implementing the Green Dot strategy. Typically institutions train anywhere from 30-50 people (or more) at such trainings - including designated prevention/ intervention staff and professionals across your institution (e.g., faculty, student affairs staff, and administrators). For more information about hosting an onsite training, including cost, contact us at info@alteristic.org. Both 4-day training formats are train-the-instructor rather than train-the-trainer, meaning that those who attend are certified to implement the program but are not certified to train others to do so. For inquiries about trainings and costs, please contact us at info@alteristic.org.

Following the 4-day instructor training, it usually takes college teams 1-6 months to gain mastery of the content and plan their implementation. To request an on-site training, we recommend that institutions contact us to schedule and contract for services at least two months prior to the training date. Three weeks prior to the on-site training, a pre-training call will take place.

Alteristic, Inc. offers free monthly technical assistance webinars for certified Green Dot instructors. During the webinars, Alteristic, Inc. staff provide updates about curriculum content, field questions from participants, and offer technical assistance. Green Dot also provides ongoing TA support for campuses implementing on an as needed basis, at no cost.

A CDC review of 140 studies (DeGue et al., 2014) and a review of evaluations conducted since the 2014 review shows that Green Dot is the only prevention approach that has been proven to reduce multiple forms of interpersonal violence. Four evaluations of Green Dot have been conducted with high school and college students and all found positive results. To date, Green Dot has been used in 100+ colleges, 50+ high schools and middle schools, 50+ communities, installations from all branches of the military, and is currently being implemented in four continents. Green Dot has been selected as the sole prevention strategy for sexual assault, stalking, and domestic violence for the United States Air Force.

Green Dot has been implemented in 100+ colleges across the United States. You can find a full list of colleges who have participated in Green Dot Training on our website:www.alteristic.org. 

Other services include Bystander Training, Student Overviews, booster sessions, social marketing, and Action Events.