Homecoming week — a week of exciting lunchtime activities and opportunities for students to show their school spirit through clothing — is often represented as the end of the beginning for the new school year.

For any high school senior this is their last chance to experience the joys of homecoming week. That being so, they are given the opportunity to run for homecoming king or queen. This year, however, one candidate for homecoming queen has everyone talking and his name is Justin Tran.

As one of the first, if not the first, males to run for homecoming queen instead of the typical king, Tran does feel like him doing so is taking a step for not only himself, but for his community too. “I decided to run for homecoming queen because I wanted to make a change at Stagg,” Tran said. “That change being how Stagg shouldn’t discriminate against people of the LGBTQ.”

As expected, there has been some disapproval expressed from students. Some would tear down his posters around the hallways or complain about the fact of there being a male running for homecoming queen. However, according to Tran even though a bit of the reaction has been negative, most have been “surprisingly mostly positive.”

Students have taken the initiative to go on social media and post comments in defense to Tran’s decision. Paragraphs and paragraphs from his fellow peers expressing how Tran shouldn’t be looked down upon for making a decision that he has the right to make. This support has sure enough made him feel accepted.

Tran describes the experience as going from a nobody to suddenly a somebody. “It’s weird when you become the talk of the school in the matter of a week,” he said. He will also be given the opportunity to participate in the homecoming parade, which has made its return this year. Overall, Tran has had fun in campaigning both for himself and the LGBTQ community.

As a result of the voting in classes, Tran has made it to top five meaning that only four others are left standing. This leaves him in the competition with Aline Arias, Marissa Pimentel, Carmina-Amparo Salmasan, and Jaynetta Williams. Although winning may not be everything to him, he would be “surprised and honored to be Stagg’s first male queen.”

He, along with the rest of the school, will find out the results at Friday night’s homecoming football game against Lodi High School.