GCAA’s second ever prom had its first ever transgender prom king. Seniors were able to nominate their choice for prom king and queen. The top nominees were then put onto a ballot and then voted on as students checked in at prom. Shane McDaniel, senior, was voted this year’s prom king.

“Well I was just figuring out if my school would make a change, and support people’s different sexualities,” McDaniel said. “so I just went on Facebook and asked friends and family if they would support me if a transgender were to run for prom king because you don’t see that a lot, and so everyone was like ‘that’s totally awesome I would like to see that happen’.”

On the night of prom, McDaniel and the other nominees and waited as Lisa Kaczmarczyk, high school principal, announced the winners.

“I was pretty shocked about it,” McDaniel said. “I was really happy that my friends actually supported me going through this, because I have a hard time at home cause my grandparents are really transphobic, and to see that my friends were open about me doing this and standing up for me, I felt pretty happy about it”

Seniors were able to nominate their choice of students who identified as a male for prom king, and students who identified as a female for prom queen. Kaczmarczyk was in charge of getting the ballots prepared for the prom.  

“We are a school that celebrates diversity, we celebrate individuality. I like for students to have a voice,” she said. “To me it is our student body’s choice to recognize, celebrate, whatever word you might choose, uniqueness, identification, orientation, whatever, of all of our kids. I think we all do a really good job here, of accepting everyone for who they are. And so it never crossed my mind to think of it any differently,” Kaczmarczyk said.

In addition to McDaniel, Antonio Snow and Jordan Washington were nominated for king. Bisa Adero, Dejah Farmer, who was homecoming queen, Jeanna Peterson, and Samar Slaughter were nominated for queen, with Farmer taking a second crown for the year.