MOCSA continues the Green Dot program

MOCSA+lesson

Roen Freeman

Pathfinder science teacher Tia Saxon leads a Green Dot lesson with her students.

Justin Gonzalez, 6th hour OTMS Productions II

The Metropolitan Organization to Counter Sexual Assault or MOCSA is a program that helps people and their families deal with sexual assault after it happened. They help by doing counseling and efficacy. Kristen Garcia is a MOCSA Youth programming specialist that got assigned to OTMS.

“If you’re ever going through something there’s our crisis line where you can call for anything if you’re in danger or if you ever need anything,” Garcia said.

Green Dot is a program where MOCSA comes to school and teaches students how to stand up for people. MOSCA also pulls students from classes to train them and they can spread the word around. Eighth grader Steven Thomas was part of the training.

I’ve used this program when one of my friends was being harmed,” Thomas said. “I told the bully that it was not okay to put somebody down because of the way they are, and that they would not like it if they were getting treated poorly. It could teach them how to stick up and be the bigger person when something is going on.” 

For teachers Green Dot really inspires them to teach students about behavioral issues. After the Green Dot lessons, Explorer teacher Kenzi Bennett had noticed her students identifying Green/Red behavior.

“If a student, for example, is afraid to do something directly when they see a red dot, they can get someone else involved or just change the conversation entirely,” Bennett said.

Voyager teacher Trevor Anderson believes that the Green Dot program is really beneficial for students and the school. He also thinks that students should recognize hurtful actions. The little time they get with Green Dot is still good because it’s small changes that would lead to further positive choices.

Green Dots are beneficial as they reinforce small habits that can result in huge change. The author J.R.R Tolkien describes this in the nature of one of his mythical hobbits that do great things because they choose small acts of kindness and bravery,” Anderson said.

Kristen is also around the school building mostly on Mondays. If you need to talk to someone, Kristen’s email is [email protected]