BOISE, Idaho — It’s prom season and traditionally for schools all over the country, it’s a time to pick a prom queen and prom king.
But at Borah High, for the first time in school history, students elected a lesbian couple as prom royalty.
2022 prom queens Kembrie Souza and Madison Cummings are seniors at Borah, and have been dating for almost a year.
"We were still in shock that we won in general, and it wasn't like 'we are lesbians and we won,'" Cummings said. "It was more like 'we won'."
After some time on the dance floor, Souza and Cummings say they realized it was much more than just the title of prom queens. They said this meant so much more to the LGBTQ community at Borah High School and the entire Gem State.
“They came up to us and they said this means so much, that you guys won this when originally wasn't a gay thing. It was a straight thing,” Cummings said.
Borah High School’s Prom Committee decided to change the name from prom queen and prom king to Prom Royalty to keep the titles gender-neutral.
"When the six nominees were announced, they sent us a separate form to ask for our name and preferred pronouns – like what we wanted to be called if we won,” said Souza.
Souza and Cummings hope this win will help open doors for future students to run for prom royalty.
"I think it's definitely a barrier that a lot of people that are in our situation, in a same-sex relationship, I think it scares them from even trying because on one hand, they might get a lot of backlash from classmates," Cummings said.
Although this year is one for the history books of Borah High School, both Souza and Cummings hope this will help normalize having same-sex prom royalty in the future.
"I think now that we've established that it can happen. People are going to be more likely be who they are on that form," Cummings said. "I think in later years, I think we are going to see that having the same-sex couple winning prom royalty is going to be a normal thing."