I ABSOLUTELY believe it is possible to prevent power-based personal violence from devastating the lives of people I care about. UP is made up of caring, courageous students, faculty, staff, and administrators who are all capable of doing something to intervene when their gut tells them there’s the potential for harm to occur. Together, we can prevent violence from happening on our campus. Together, we can create a culture in which power-based personal violence is simply unacceptable.

When I was in college, friends virtually never tried to stop a peer from driving while intoxicated. Today, "friends don't let friends drive drunk" is a widely recognized phrase, and students routinely intervene to prevent an intoxicated peer from getting behind the wheel. We can reduce sexual assault and protect our friends by taking the same proactive approach. Sexual assault is too devastating to individuals and to our community to err on the side of doing nothing

As the Vice President for Student Affairs, my highest priority is the safety and well-being of our students. I am thrilled to have a program like Green Dot on our campus— it raises awareness about power-based personal violence and helps us prevent these acts of violence in the future.

I really love the University of Portland and I am incredibly grateful for my education, opportunities to serve, and amazing friendships. Green Dot can affect a culture change -- it can make UP a better place. We all want life to be better, and Green Dot gives us some practical skills for making change.

I am committed to the Green Dot program because too many people continue to be hurt by violence. I want to be part of the solution...I want to be part of a program that prevents violence before it starts and help create a world safe for my spouse and son.

Green Dot is about respect. Ralph Waldo Emerson suggests that we are respectable only as we respect. What more is there to say? Let's always respect one another.

Knowing that 1 in 3 female students will experience sexual violence during their college careers is unacceptable. I think of my three children and feel a sense of urgency about creating a different type of culture. Green Dot teaches us how to make small but significant choices that chip away at a culture that maintains violence.

All I want to do, all it seems I've ever wanted to do, is scrape a little bit of crud off this bruised, blessed world. I'm not a hero with super powers, but Green Dot helps me understand that my small choices make a difference in someone's life, and so do others' choices for wiping out personal violence.

Every day we see people are in violatile, dangerous situations. In many instances, people are reluctant to get involved, to speak out, to ask for help. We all have these opportunities to intervene, to act, to help, to prevent violence. Green Dot is an effor to empower all of us to act often, intervene early, and redirect so that a potentially bad situation remains safe.

I've heard too many stories from students, friends from college, family, and loved ones about being hurt. Hit by someone who you thought loved you, forced into sex by a partner, touched without permission, repeatedly yelled at and told you were worthless. It has to stop. That's why I'm a part of Green Dot. I believe it is a way to help stop the stories. Green Dot teaches how we can step in – in ways that make sense and are easy to do – to stop violence from happening. I want that for our campus.

When I started talking to friends and family about my involvement in Green Dot, I was amazed by how many of them had been personally and permanently affected by power-based personal violence. Green Dot was no longer, "a good thing," it was something I HAD to do. After my experience with Green Dot Bystander Training, I realized that not only CAN I make a difference, I MUST make a difference.

Green means GO.

Green Dot shows me how my small actions as a bystander can derail and defuse power-based personal violence. I want the UP community to be a Green Dot greenhouse: for our students, faculty, and staff. Green dots are the seedlings needed to help grow a safer world for my children and grandchildren.

I'm very pleased to support the efforts of Green Dot. Preventing personal violence in all of its forms is an integral part of our common call to lift up the human dignity of others. The simple yet powerful means of education and bystander training, for example, can transform our thinking about how much we can contribute individually to the elimination of acts of violence on campus, in our local communities, and among the wider population in our society.

I’ve always wanted to get involved in preventing power-based personal violence, but as a guy I never felt fully welcomed in the discussion. I am committed to Green Dot because it’s a program that welcomes just about everyone and everyone has something to contribute.

I am a son, a brother, a husband, a father, an uncle, and a friend. In my role at UP, I promote student-athlete development. I am inspired by the Green Dot, knowing that we will create a culture of safety for positive, personal growth. I am committed! Your loved ones and my loved ones deserve it!

Green Dot is just common sense. It's an easy way for every one of us to protect each other from harm.

Here are my statistics: Today my daughter is 19 months old. She walks around, says 36 words. In a seemingly seven seconds, she'll be moving out of the house, maybe on her way to college. Green Dot gives me hope for her safety. In the same way that I keep watch for red dots, in the same way that I intervene for the young men and women in our community, I hope that others will keep watch for her.

My step-daughter is a center back on her university soccer team. When I hear statistics like "1 in 4 female students will experience sexual violence during their college years," I think of the women on her defensive line and know one of them has or will get hurt. Green Dot gives me hope that we can change those numbers.

I believe in the power of one. We have seen the impact of one person on the world in Jesus, Gandhi, MLK, Jr., and Mother Teresa. Can we dare to step up and step out as they did? I believe the best in each of us has this instinct to respond, to reach out, and to be the one who makes a difference. And we have the capacity to do so again and again!