Williston Northampton School played host to a special event in April 2026: a Best Buddies International Friendship Walk—the first of its kind in Western Massachusetts

Best Buddies International is a nonprofit organization “dedicated to establishing a global volunteer movement that creates opportunities for one-to-one friendships, integrated employment, leadership development, inclusive living, and family support for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD).” Williston has had a Best Buddies chapter for three years now, and the group is what the organization calls a “promoter” chapter—meaning Williston’s Best Buddies volunteers work to help bring events and causes to life.

“It’s been awesome seeing this chapter grow,” said Senior Class President Alex Landon ’26, who helped bring a Best Buddies chapter to campus. “I’ve had a lot of great support from people here at the school and Best Buddies leaders. It’s been really rewarding to see all of these things come to fruition.”

Williston volunteers have helped out at Best Buddies events before, but always at different venues. Their work has included helping staff the annual Best Buddies prom, and volunteering to help set up and then clean up a fundraiser event this past winter at Riverside Industries, Inc. in Easthampton.

This year, Best Buddies asked if Williston would be willing to host a Friendship Walk.

“When they asked, I said I’d love that,” said Dr. Pam Maddock, the school’s advisor for the club. “From there I just contacted [Director of Athletics] Jade Morris and [Director of Summer Programming] Kevin Burke and made it happen.”

Maddock, who served as a chapter advisor at a previous school, said seeing the Friendship Walk come to fruition with a big turnout of Williston students was wonderful.

“The Best Buddies staff did a phenomenal job setting everything up, then we had a huge turnout for students,” said Maddock, “which was fantastic given that it was long weekend. We’re looking forward to next year already.”

The Friendship Walk was more than just a walk, though. Before the event, attendees gathered inside the Sabina Cain Family Athletic Center to play games like hopscotch and Connect Four, along with an inflatable hoop shoot machine. In addition to Williston students, participating local chapters were also on hand, including Longmeadow High School and the University of Massachusetts.

For the walk itself, participants moved outside to Sawyer Field and walked a lap on the path that lines the perimeter of the field. And even with the sun tucked behind the clouds, there were rays of sunshine to be seen.

“It was great to see all these different communities coming together,” said Landon. “Everybody just had a smile on their face. It wasn’t a beautiful weather day, but everybody got past that and enjoyed themselves. That was so rewarding to see.”

For Best Buddies workers, the assistance from the Williston chapter made all the difference.

“Williston’s support of the first annual Western Massachusetts Friendship Walk event was immensely helpful from the very early stages of planning,” said Makayla Waldman, Manager of Mission Advancement for Best Buddies. “We couldn’t be more grateful to the Williston community for welcoming us. The costs saved on location alone were a huge help and allowed us to use those funds on activities and accessibility improvements for our walkers.”

Williston’s chapter of Best Buddies hopes the walk is the start of a big annual event. While Landon will not be a part of the club next year as he heads off to Dartmouth College, he is hopeful that the momentum will continue carrying forward.

“Best Buddies is truly an amazing organization, and I’m very glad and grateful that I became involved with it,” he said. “Getting the walk to happen was a huge goal of ours because it really has had a huge impact on not only the Williston community, but also the local Western Mass. Community.”