For more than two decades, Dr. James P. Griffin Jr., a research assistant professor in MSM's Department of Community Health and Preventive Medicine, has focused his efforts on alcohol, tobacco, drug and violence prevention. Griffin talks about two city-wide inititatives that are positively impacting Atlanta.

Q: What is the Metropolitan Atlanta Violence Prevention Partnership (MAVPP)?
A: MAVPP began in October 2005 and its mission is promoting healthy families and healthy communities. For the first time in metro Atlanta, we have brought together representatives from community- and faith-based organizations, academics, schools and government to energize and strengthen violence prevention. Participants include WSB-TV, the Atlanta Police Department, Atlanta Public Schools, Georgia State University, Clark Atlanta University, Emory University and various community-based organizations.

Q: What kind of violent activity are we talking about?
A: There are four key city-wide program areas: school violence, street violence, gang violence and sexual violence. The greatest concern we have is in homicides among African-American males between the ages of 19-44 in a five-county target area. The rate of violence is as much as 10 times higher than death rates for males in other cultures in that age group. It's heart-wrenching.

Q: Put this in perspective for us. Aren't we all affected?
A: You are exactly right. These are systematic issues that are far-reaching. One way or another, regardless of race or socio-economics, our entire community is affected by violence. The MAVPP's long-term goal is to serve as a clearinghouse for violence prevention, including family violence, domestic violence, elder abuse, child maltreatment, even suicide treatment. Creating more advocates in those areas is key, as is bringing in the business community.

Q: What sorts of things is MAVPP doing?
A: This is a capacity-building initiative. We are helping people who provide violence prevention services to do a better job of violence prevention. We do this through an initiative that is an offspring of the MAVPP. We conduct assessments and based on our findings, tailor our efforts to the individual organization. We train students how to better negotiate their environment without resorting to violence. These research-based alternatives followed a study I published last year in the Journal of School Violence. The program also uses peer influence to encourage non-violence and positive behavior.

Q: So you are, in effect, supporting those on the front lines?
A: We are building organizations that will employ strategies and methodologies that come out of solid research. We are tying together different partners to share what works. Everything doesn't have to be our baby. Our goal is to give away ownership of the technology and state-of-the art techniques, achieve full saturation and create a sustainable science and research program in the community.

Q: What do you mean by full saturation?
A: The whole city would receive the best available violence protection services. We wouldn't have some metro areas getting high-quality services and some hardly impacted. Everyone would be using what is known to work.

Q: The second program originated out of the MAVPP and it is called the Atlanta Violence Prevention Capacity Building Project (ACBP). Tell us about it.
A: Four organizations - MSM, The Advocacy Foundation, Genesis Prevention Coalition and Visions Unlimited - have come together to provide school-based materials and curricula to reduce school-based violence. Some public high schools in our city are having unbelievable gang-related scuffles, out-and-out bedlam with fighting.

Q: What's the strategy?
A: ACBP uses a capacity-building framework to provide training and technical assistance at no charge for 500 participants over a three-year period. In fact, I think we can train 1,000 people. We will address the challenges of interpersonal youth violence and gang involvement with something more constructive. After only a year, we have had tremendous accomplishments! An integral part of the program is a plan to expose faith-based organizations, schools, law enforcement and other community-based organizations to a top-of-the-line violence prevention strategy called PeaceBuilders.

Q: What is PeaceBuilders?
A: PeaceBuilders is a strategy from a national organization that we are rolling out in Atlanta in 2007. In an effort to promote a nonviolent environment, PeaceBuilders works to encourage high behavioral expectations and improve the school climate.

Q: So what yields high expectations?
A: There are six principles: 1. Praise people, 2. Right wrongs, 3. Give up put-downs, 4. Seek wise people, 5. Notice and speak up about hurts and 6. Help others. PeaceBuilders works one-on-one with the kids themselves. The youth carry a message of accountability that cuts violence.

Q: These are the kinds of behaviors you would hope would be taught at home.
A: Yes, but many kids do not get these guidelines at home. Too many of these inner-city kids that we are talking about have absentee fathers and absent mothers or mothers with substance abuse problems. Not in all cases, but the parents are not necessarily there for them. Kids are raising kids. That's the reason they don't get principles like this.

Q: What makes this program different?
A: Kids are the driving force of PeaceBuilders. If the adults are out of line or inconsistent, they let us know! Former gang members serve as facilitators of violence prevention. A Youth Advisory Board operates parallel to the Adult Advisory Board; they attended the National Coalition Building Conference in Washington, D.C., and did a blog on efforts to prevent violence. Some of the youth who help with our violence prevention efforts are a mixture of goody-two shoes kids and hard-core gang members. We are also having a Peace Week kick-off that Douglass High School is conducting with Elizabeth Baptist Church to help kids take ownership.

Q: That would certainly lend credibility to the program.
A: Yes, it's very compelling.

Q: What else is innovative about ACBP?
A: We are not going to hoard the training. Each of the three partners has 50 slots, so we can train 200 PeaceBuilders. But if MSM only uses 25 slots, we will open up the remaining slots to law enforcement and other faith- and community-based organizations that are not directly funded. That is a coup for Atlanta. We will provide training and curriculum to upgrade the overall quality of services.

Q: How will you evaluate the program's success?
A: We are very, very excited about our audio-enhanced, computer-assisted, structured interviewing. We have state-of-the-art evaluation methodology to upgrade our data collection methods.

Q: Can you explain how that will work?
A: We will use handheld computers or personal digital assistants (PDAs). Questions in the surveys are entered onto the handheld computer; headphones are attached. The device reads the questions to the high schooler who taps the answer in, and then it reads the next question, and so on until the end. Kids love it. It's their way of operating in the 21st century with video games and iPods. The data is then copied to the desktop computer for analysis, eliminating the data entry bottleneck. It's critical for kids who have reading comprehension difficulties. It also encourages kids to be more forthcoming about answering sensitive questions since there is greater privacy.

Q: Wow-what a great idea!
A: Only a few researchers on the front lines are teaching community-based organizations to use them for gauging program success. It's a completely different class of sophistication. Atlanta's community-based organizations will lead the country in using this PDA technology. The downside is getting enough PDAs to simultaneously collect information. The upside is the level of quality of data.

Q: Your work is heavy, but you sound upbeat.
A: Sometimes I get completely worn out. But I'm resilient and I enjoy it. These activities put me in the middle of everything going on in violence prevention. It's about forming genuine partnerships in order to help communities become healthier.