School
adopts gender-neutral homecoming court, so there might be no ‘king’ or
‘queen’
Breaking with the tradition at many of the nation’s schools, students
at Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School will adopt a gender-neutral
homecoming court this year, moving away from the longtime practice of
electing a boy as “king” and a girl as “queen.”
Students in each grade will vote for two classmates from a ballot of
finalists, with the top vote-getters crowned at the school’s homecoming
football game. It’s a change that means those honored at halftime on
Oct. 7 could include two boys, two girls, transgender students or a
boy-girl duo.
“It provides an opportunity for all students to be involved in
something that was exclusionary,” said Jacob Rains, president of the
schoolwide Student Government Association. “It is really not our job,
especially with a gender-neutral and transgender population at B-CC, to
tell people that boys have to be kings and girls have to be queens. Who
are we to put people into those categories?”
The change at the high-performing school in Montgomery County comes as
others across the country have begun to rethink how gender
classifications affect students. Many Montgomery high schools changed
how they assign graduation robes: Instead of using one color for girls
and another for boys, they have all students wear the same color.
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