Milestones

Best Buddies Jobs, a supported employment program targeting high-paying, corporate jobs for people with intellectual disabilities, launches in Florida, California and Massachusetts.

Best Buddies High Schools is established with the goal of pairing special education students in one-to-one friendships with high school volunteers.

Best Buddies Middle Schools pilot program is launched, reaching a younger age group with the hope that inclusion of people with intellectual disabilities will have a lasting effect on societal norms for the next generation.

e-Buddies_® is launched as a cutting-edge e-mail friendship program.

Best Buddies holds the inaugural Best Buddies Challenge in Hyannis Port.

For the first time, Best Buddies has participants in all 50 states and on six continents.

Best Buddies Friendship Walks are established.

Rosa’s Law replaces several instances of “mental retardation” in Federal law with “intellectual disability”.

For the first time, Best Buddies has programs in 50 countries around the world.

The Eunice Kennedy Shriver Act, which authorized federal funds for Best Buddies, passed the U.S. House of Representatives on May 19, 2010.