JOINT BASE LANGLEY-EUSTIS, Va. –
Annual Green Dot training for Joint Base Langley-Eustis kicked off at various locations across base this past March.
Green Dot is a bystander intervention program, which aims at doing small things to eventually change culture and reduce the number of self-directed violence and interpersonal violence, such as sexual assault, domestic violence and stalking.
“Every person matters and every person counts, not just the people in the agencies doing intervention and prevention work,” said Pamela Adams, 633rd Air Base Wing violence prevention integrator. “One thing that I really like about the Green Dot program is that it gives people options because not everyone is assertive enough to be direct and approach someone and say ‘hey that’s not appropriate, cut that out, what are you doing?’”
This year’s training will run until December, and is open to all active duty U.S. Air Force, Air National Guard and Reserve Airmen, as well as government and non-appropriated funds employees. Training is not required for contractors, unless it is written in their statement of work.
During the course of the training period, both initial and refresher classes are being offered. Refresher classes, which are one hour long, are for anyone who has had Green Dot training in 2016 or 2017. For people who have never had training, the hour and a half long initial classes are available.
Adams advises members to get their annual training sooner than later and take advantage of available seats as extra classes will not be offered to supplement procrastinators.
“Violence prevention is a readiness issue—many do not view it as such, but incidents of interpersonal violence and suicide are the things that worry leadership, consume time and energy, and impact many aspects of victims' and offenders' lives, and those connected to them,” said Adams. “It can also potentially affect the unit in terms of morale, cohesion, and trust in relationships with fellow co-workers and leadership. When we focus on proactive prevention, we don’t have to always be in react-respond mode, scrambling to help with each incident. We want to prevent these incidents from happening in the first place, so that we can all keep our focus on the mission at hand.”
Adams also encourages members to actively utilize their training to assist those who may be experiencing interpersonal and self-directed violence.
“I want people to know that you are the one person that could make a difference. You may not feel like you’re in a situation or in a place where you’re like ‘I’m going to stop this sexual assault; I’m going to stop this domestic incident from happening,’ but with every small gesture...those are the things that make a difference,” said Adams. “What I don’t want is this to be a one and done—I’ve done my annual training for the year and I never have to think about Green Dot again because someone else at any point is depending on what you learned in class. It could be any of us at any time, so that’s the legacy that I want to leave for all of us on this base as we go about our everyday lives.”
To register for class, visit https://www.milsuite.mil/book/groups/joint-base-langley-eustis-violence-prevention/overview. For more information, contact Adams at 764-5433.