WASHINGTON D.C. EXPERIENCE: Montgomery Academy's Britt gets taste of government as senate page

Montgomery Academy’s Bennett Britt recently took time off from sports to be a page in the US Senate. (Tim Gayle)

By TIM GAYLE

It had to be one of the toughest decisions Bennett Britt ever made.

The Montgomery Academy three-sport star could continue to work on athletics as she prepared for her senior season with the Eagles or she could walk away from athletics for six months for a once-in-a-lifetime job as a Senate page.

Basketball could wait -- Britt was sitting out over the holidays as she recovered from a concussion -- but there were other athletic considerations as well.

“I also have track in the spring and in the past I’ve played club (volleyball) during that time, too,” she said. “That’s about 10 hours a week playing volleyball during the offseason. It was definitely hard to grasp (becoming a page) because you want to come into your senior season as strong as you can be.”

Her mother, U.S. Sen. Katie Britt, first suggested the idea of becoming a Senate page -- limited to 30 applicants nationwide each year -- when she took office three years ago.

“When I was sworn in, I mentioned to them (Bennett and her brother Ridgeway), ‘Look, there’s pages, would you like to do that?’” Katie Britt recalled. “Both kids seemed fairly uninterested in that. I never brought it up again.

“Then she looked it up, did all the research, figured out how she would have to apply, who all took pages, and went through the process.”

Bennett had a change of heart after being exposed to political science and government courses at Montgomery Academy.

“I wanted to stay home and play my sports and do things like that,” Bennett said. “But then I ended up becoming more and more interested … and being involved in speech and debate at MA as well, I became really interested in global politics.

“That was one of the reasons I wanted to go. Then, just being up there with her as well. She has to work during the week in D.C. most of the time. I wanted to spend more time with her so that was a good way to do it.”

Katie Britt didn’t have the seniority to warrant a page, so Bennett became a page for Senate Majority Leader John Thune of South Dakota.

“He was so fun,” Bennett said. “He was probably the best one to do it for. The experience as a whole, I think ‘immersed’ is the best word to use for it. You’re there every single day. Everything that’s happening on the Senate floor, you get to see. You get to see the conversations between senators and their interactions. You also get to see the coolest things” such as the president’s State of the Union Address and King Charles’ address to Congress.

And, of course, Bennett had a front-row seat to watch her mother at work.

“She was there for so many monumental moments,” Katie said. “The one great thing about being up there is it gave her a window into what I do on a day-to-day basis.”

While in Washington, Bennett went to school every weekday before going to work in the Capitol.  

“We had school at 5:30 every morning,” she said. “There was one night where we got up at 5 a.m. for school, we went to the Capitol at 9 a.m. and we ended up at the Capitol until 6 a.m. the next day. Then they woke us up at 8:30.”

“It’s a highly competitive and selective process with a very rigorous schedule,” Katie said. “They get up at 5 a.m., they have to be downstairs for school around 5:30 and they start their schoolwork. Then they end up around the Senate floor at 10 a.m. when we open up and on their early nights, which is two days a week, they get off at 6 p.m. On the other nights, they work until we’re done.

“There are several nights where we were there late into the night or through the night where I have pictures with Bennett where she said, ‘Mom, when we finish voting at 4-something in the morning or 5 o’clock, let’s go get a picture with the sunrise.’”

But during those months in Washington, Bennett was not only away from track and volleyball and her fellow athletes, she also was away from her classmates.

“That was one of the things where (being a Senate page) had to be an independent adventure for her to kind of figure out if she wants to do it, but also an independent decision,” Katie said. “To miss volleyball was significant. Obviously, not the season, but being around, playing travel, all those things. She really missed the school, missed the team, missed her friends, all of that.”

Meanwhile, after making the decision to step away from volleyball for six months, Bennett discovered Montgomery Academy officials were having to replace head coach Carly Falcione in May, adding to the stress Bennett must have felt in her absence from the school and her favorite sport. Thankfully, new coach Jada Coleman was promoted from an assistant coaching position and already knew Bennett.

“Bennett is an insane athlete,” Coleman said. “She was gone out of camp all summer long. She flew back just for team camp when we went to Georgia Tech. One thing I love about Bennett is she is where her feet are. When she’s at volleyball, everything is poured into volleyball. When she’s doing something for school, everything is poured into school. So when she steps on the court, it’s game face and she’s ready to go. She has such a dog mentality. She wants to put the ball away and she wants to do whatever she can for the team to better us.”

Bennett was grateful the new coach worked with her schedule to get her ready for her senior season.

“Coach ‘C’ worked a lot with me whenever I did get to come back during the summer in making sure I got those touches and I wasn’t too rusty,” Bennett said. “Coach ‘C’ has done a really good job. Especially since she was one of our assistant coaches last year, she understands all of us. And I think another thing that helped is we have so many seniors on the team. Five of us are seniors and we’ve all been on the team since at least the 10th grade.”

Coleman, meanwhile, was just as grateful she had a player willing to put in the extra work.

“Of course, she wasn’t able to be at the school during the offseason,” Coleman said, “and she was gone for a good majority of the time during the summer. But when she was home, for a week and a half during the summer, every single day she was trying to get into the gym. She’d text me, ‘Hey Coach C, can I get into the gym? Hey Coach C, can I get extra reps?’ That’s what makes her stand out. It would have been easy for her to be like, ‘I’m going to be gone another month, these reps won’t count,’ but she was getting into the gym, getting hitting reps, serve-receive reps. She is so hungry to get better.”

Bennett has emerged as one of the area’s top players in only her second year as an outside hitter. In 2024, as a sophomore, she was the middle blocker, waiting her turn before moving outside as a junior.

“I actually did play middle for club as well,” Bennett said. “I think the biggest difference is it’s more of a leadership role on the outside because you’re having to talk more to your teammates, showing them where to go.”

Bennett’s mother said the senior has always put the team first, but is constantly working on personal improvement as well.  

“She’s played different positions, depending on what the need was of the team at the time,” Katie said. “She loves the game and she loves being a part of the team. She continues to push herself to be the very best she can be and you can see her skills just continue to improve as a result. A lot of this (improvement and development) is her own studying of the game and the position. A great deal of her success is harnessing God-given talent and self-driving.”

The past three years has put Bennett under a microscope at times, simply because of her mother’s power and influence, but it doesn’t seem to bother the volleyball standout.

“I feel like my life has remained very similar to what it was before,” she said. “Of course, you have amazing opportunities that are available to you because of what she does and because of the hard work she puts in for our state, but she does a really good job of making sure that we get to be normal kids and have a normal high school experience.”

Bennett could use her volleyball talent to earn a college scholarship offer, but she is just as likely to lean toward her academic offers for guidance.

“I went and toured Alabama,” she said. “It was absolutely amazing. Everyone there is so kind. They really do make you feel at home. Alabama is definitely high on the list, but I’m not sure quite yet. I think I would definitely be interested in (college volleyball) but I really like academic things as well. I think wherever is the best academic fit would be the first thing but volleyball would be a consideration.”

 Her father was an All-American football player at Alabama, but her mother -- who also graduated from Alabama -- isn’t sure what direction Bennett will take when it comes to her collegiate choice.

“Her ability to focus and her discipline, I have never seen anything like it,” Katie said. “You see her work hard and her passion for the team but she also brings that to the classroom as well. To be able to do what she did in D.C. and to be removed from day-to-day but still keep herself fit and engaged and improving shows what kind of incredible young women she is.”

First, Bennett would like to lead her volleyball team to another state championship. After two years of losing in the Class 6A South Super Regional, Bennett and her teammates are eager to break through in the newly created Class A Private regional.

“I think it’s different because we’re not in 6A,” she said. “This year, we’ve been putting more focus on our individual technique and making sure we are conditioned and ready because the only thing that was hard at 6A is we had 12, 13 people on our team and they had rosters that are so much bigger than ours. Now, with the smaller classification, I think it’ll be different as well as we’re putting more emphasis on making sure we’re physically fit and conditioned and ready for those long (five-set) games.”