Elayne Bennett

Elayne Bennett developed the Best Friends program for adolescent girls in 1987 while serving at the Child Development Center at Georgetown University. Due to its success, teachers and principals encouraged her to create a program for boys, leading to the launch of the Best Men program in 2000. She is the President and Founder of the Best Friends Foundation and the author of the Best Friends program model and curriculum materials for elementary, middle, and high school students.

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Mrs. Bennett has personally taught the Foundation’s character education curriculum focused on drug, violence, and abuse prevention in 27 DC Public Schools across Wards 1–8. The Best Friends and Best Men programs have served more than 5,000 students in DC Public Schools and an additional 3,000 students nationwide.

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A recognized national spokeswoman on adolescent behavior and youth development, Mrs. Bennett addresses the challenges facing young people in today’s culture and presents solutions for strengthening peer relationships, character development, and academic achievement. She has appeared on national television programs including ABC Nightline, CBS The Early Show, PBS To the Contrary, Fox News’ The O’Reilly Factor and The Story with Martha MacCallum, ABC World News Tonight, and NBC’s The Today Show.

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Her speeches and writings have contributed to several books, including Giving Back by Merrill J. Oster and Mike Hamel, Restoring the Teenage Soul by Margaret Meeker, M.D., and Building a Healthy Society edited by Don Eberly. Her Op-Ed, “The Violence in Our Schools Must Stop,” was published in LifeZette. She is also the author of Daughters in Danger: Helping Girls Thrive in Today’s Culture (2014), a book recommended by educators for parents of adolescents.

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Mrs. Bennett has testified before the U.S. House of Representatives on the Best Friends model of positive peer interaction in the prevention of teen pregnancy. Her program research data in DC Public Schools was accepted for publication in the Journal for Adolescent and Family Health in 2005. A 2010 Georgetown University study of 900 DCPS students demonstrated significant increases in students’ willingness to reject risk behaviors and advise peers against drugs, alcohol, violence, and early sexual activity, along with measurable decreases in those behaviors.

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She currently serves on the Board of Directors of the National Dropout Prevention Network and has served on the Board of Visitors of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Mrs. Bennett earned her B.A. and M.Ed. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and completed doctoral coursework in statistical analysis and research design at UNC and the University of Maryland, College Park.

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She has received numerous honors, including the Jefferson Award for National Public Service, the John Carroll Society Award, the William E. Simon Foundation Award for Social Entrepreneurship, and the St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Award.

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Mrs. Bennett is the wife of William J. Bennett and the mother of two sons.