When it comes to one of the nation's most widely-used college sexual assault prevention programs, Greg Liautaud lives its teachings, literally.

A junior at Connecticut College, Liautaud and sophomore Matt Gaetz have made themselves the resident Green Dot counselors in their campus apartment building, unofficially training their neighbors how to step in whenever they witness situations that could lead to assault.

Green Dot is one of the bystander intervention programs that hundreds of colleges across the country are using to combat sexual violence. If people spot a guy at a party who may be bothering or taking advantage of someone, the thinking goes, they can interrupt the situation and then stop the potential assailant's momentum -- preventing a sexual assault from happening. No one even needs to utter the word "rape."

"You step in like that and it kind of just ends the situation," Liautaud explained. "It's not really about calling someone a bad person, it's just defusing the situation."

That's the appeal of bystander intervention programs like Green Dot, experts say. Rather than treating everyone as a potential rapist or rape victim, students are treated like allies who are empowered to step in. And according to research, it's working: For example, John Foubert, who received a grant from the Department of Education to study the impact of bystander intervention, found in 2007 that fraternity men who were trained in bystander intervention were 40 percent less likely to commit sexual violence.

Liautaud and Gaetz, who both play on their school's men's hockey team, say Green Dot training has become standard for them and their teammates. No one is formally required to go through the training, but with so much buy-in on the team and around campus, the athletes do it anyway. The team's fifth annual Green Dot-themed hockey game on Saturday drew the largest crowd of the season, with 500 attendees -- more than double the typical amount.

After five years, Green Dot is as much a part of life for the hockey team as practice. "Even new players are coming into a culture that's set in stone," Gaetz said. "It's almost better that they embrace it on their own."