US: Another trans student wins homecoming title

Concord High's Ray Ramsey was overwhelming favourite of student body

A transgender student in New Hampshire was crowned homecoming king of his high school, the Concord Monitor reports.

Ray Ramsey, 17, who came out as transgender in his junior year, told the Monitor that both his home and Concord High School have been supportive environments.

Ramsey’s win follows last month’s crowning of another transgender high schooler, Cassidy Lynn Campbell, who was chosen homecoming queen of Marina High School in Huntington Beach.

Following Campbell’s victory, her school principal praised the “message of acceptance, tolerance and respect” that her win represented. It’s a message that was echoed by the head of Ramsey’s school, Gene Connolly, who hailed Concord High’s student body for having “a heart” and knowing “what’s right.”

In Pennsylvania, Kasey Caron was not as lucky as Campbell and Ramsey.

Richland School Board administrators told Caron he couldn’t run for homecoming king, even though he identifies as male.

While Caron’s driver’s licence now reflects his preferred gender identity, a school board solicitor has said that a person’s gender reassignment must be certified by a physician for the state to recognize the change, Pink News reports.

Natasha Barsotti is originally from Trinidad and Tobago in the Caribbean. She had high aspirations of representing her country in Olympic Games sprint events, but after a while the firing of the starting gun proved too much for her nerves. So she went off to university instead. Her first professional love has always been journalism. After pursuing a Master of Journalism at UBC , she began freelancing at Xtra West — now Xtra Vancouver — in 2006, becoming a full-time reporter there in 2008.

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