Tackling the issue of school violence
Courtesy photo Jen Hayman (front right in grey) brought Green Dot training to her senior classmates as part of her senior project. Green Dot training is designed to help trainees recognize power based violence and abuse and stop it.
By JOSH MCDONALD
Staff Reporter
It isn’t very often that you see a high school student looking at the bigger picture, but Wallace Jr./Sr. High School senior Jen Hayman isn’t just an average high schooler.
The seniors from the local high schools are tasked every year with putting together a senior project that encapsulates something they find interesting, while fitting inside certain school set criteria.
Last week, Hayman successfully brought her project to her classmates.
The project, “Bringing Green Dot Training to Wallace High School,” came to life after Hayman attended a seminar with her mom almost one year ago.
“My mom brought me to a Green Dot seminar last May,” Hayman said. “After sitting through it, we decided that this would be something cool to bring to school and it would be a good senior project.”
Green Dot Bystander Intervention is an approach to prevent violence with the help of bystanders, built on the premise that violence can be measurably and systematically reduced within a community.
It’s mission is to reduce power-based violence by being a proactive bystander and a reactive bystander. Power-based violence includes sexual violence, domestic violence, dating violence, stalking, child abuse, elder abuse and bullying.
The program trains people about sexual assault and domestic violence on college campuses, primary and secondary schools, and communities.
Initially, Hayman couldn’t decide if she wanted to put on the seminar for the senior class, student counsel or the WHS Staff. Ultimately she chose to bring the training to her fellow seniors.
“Considering that a lot of sexual abuse begins and happens during college years, it made sense to train the next class that was headed to college,” Hayman said. “I know sexual abuse is a problem at the college level and I wanted to make sure that myself and my classmates knew how to handle a situation for themselves or for someone else if it ever becomes evident that it is going on.”
Condensing the normally five-hour training course into just a couple hours was both challenging and opportune for Hayman, as it held the students attention and didn’t require them to miss much class time.
“They hit a lot of the main points,” Hayman said. “But everyone was engaged and paid attention. I think it went really well.”
WHS principal Chris Lund agreed with Hayman and praised the selection of such a difficult topic.
“All students should be going through training like this,” Lund said. “It’s very helpful in preparing students to deal with things that may happen when they leave here, and make sure they have an understanding and that they know what to do should a situation ever arise.”
The Green Dot Bystander Intervention Program was founded by Dr. Dorothy Edwards in 2006. The goal of the program is to implement a bystander intervention strategy that prevents and reduces power-based personal violence.
The curriculum is created from the concepts and lessons learned through research and theory across disciplines including violence against women, diffusion of innovation, public health, social networking, psychology, bystander dynamics, perpetration and marketing/advertising.