Another transgender high-school student in Pennsylvania is taking on his school board over a discriminatory school policy.
A Johnstown teen this week petitioned the Richland School Board to override his principal’s decision to ban him from running for homecoming king, instead relegating him to the female side of the homecoming court.
There are a number of issues at play here and, in each, the youth involved are the ones who have shown courage and conviction, while the adults seem to be acting of cowardice.
Senior Kasey Caron reportedly was initially told by a counselor that he could run on the male ballot, but that decision was squashed by the principal, who cited legal reasons for the change. Even with that development, Caron, who presents as a male, was elected by his classmates to the court. High-school elections such as this have the potential to elicit immaturity or cattiness, but Caron’s classmates clearly respected him — and his gender identity — enough to elect him to represent them on the court.
However, once on the court, school officials told Caron he would have to bring his own date to the event, rather than be paired with one of the males on the court, as are the rest of the queen nominees. So the administration mandated he run for homecoming queen but then acknowledged that he doesn’t quite fit the mold of the female nominees and relegated him to his own special category. Forget the confusion this decision raises; the blatant “othering” that school officials forced on Caron with that move is alarming. Add in the fact that administrators were so apprehensive to pair two male-presenting students together, and you also have a hefty slap to LGB students, on top of the obvious discrimination against transgender and gender-nonconforming students.
When he took his case to the school board, it got even worse. One board member referred to him as female, others scoffed at the male gender marker on his driver’s license. They instead suggested he would need to undergo sexual-reassignment surgery and have the gender marker on his birth certificate changed before he could run for homecoming king. So the Department of Motor Vehicles, a state agency, recognizes that Caron is a male, yet that is not good enough for a high-school dance?
But again, the bright spot of the meeting was the youth. About 100 supporters turned out to Monday night’s meeting, including many classmates, as well as family and community members. These young people at Richland are supposed to look to their school administrators for guidance and leadership, but instead school officials need to take direction from their pupils.
Let’s hope they learn their lesson.