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Bystander Intervention Programs

The bystander approach is a promising approach to sexual violence prevention, as it encourages the community to take ownership of sexual violence as a problem and speak up when they witness potentially dangerous situations or sexist language. Other benefits of this approach include reducing victim blaming, including everyone as part of the solution, and giving the community an opportunity to foster social change. Even so, it can be intimidating to become an active bystander; there are social pressures and personal safety that come into play. 

Here are some curriculum-based programs that may be helpful if you are considering implementing an existing bystander program:

  • Green Dot http://www.livethegreendot.com/

    This program is tailored for college campuses but has been expanding into communities. It requires an extensive training by the creators of the program. Several colleges and a few community sexual assault programs in Washington have been trained already. 

 

  • Mentors in Violence Prevention (MVP) http://www.jacksonkatz.com/mvp.html

    This curriculum focuses on student athletes and student leaders as "popular opinion leaders" to influence their peers. There are separate curricula available for high school females, high school males, and college males. This curriculum is available in the WCSAP library.  It comes with playbooks and can be used without formal training. 

 

Here are some useful program websites that may be helpful if you are considering creating your own bystander program:

  • The Red Flag Campaign http://theredflagcampaign.org/

    This is a public awareness campaign for college campuses that urges bystanders to "say something" when they see a red flag of dating violence, stalking, or sexual assault. Although there is a planning guide for interactive pieces, a large component of this campaign is a poster series. The campaign does not require training but the posters must be purchased.

 

  • Virginia Tech's Bystander Intervention Playbook http://www.stopabuse.vt.edu/bystander.php 

    This may be a useful tool to provide strategies for being an active bystander. Although created by a college community, this is a tool that could be easily used with younger audiences and is youth-friendly in its design. The Playbook comes as a PDF file but the link above is for the site, which contains the Playbook as well as other useful talking points.

 

  •  Mediation @ MIT http://web.mit.edu/bystanders/index.html

    This online resource accompanies programs that are held on the campus. Although the campus programs are not available to others, the online portion contains very helpful bystander scripts and tools to share. 

 

  • The Know Your Power Campaign (part of Bringing in the Bystander)  http://www.know-your-power.org/

    This campaign is part of a marketing and social research project from the University of New Hampshire. The site provides tips and resources that are directed at the students at UNH but can be useful for similar audiences. Additionally, there is a very well-designed and developed poster campaign that can be purchased. 

 

Related Content

 

Additional Online Resrouces

 

 

Reviewed: April 30th, 2012