When transgender teenager Nikko Nelson won prom queen at her high school in Wisconsin earlier this month, she was surprised - but not because she's trans.
“My friend was in the hallway and she came up to me and she said: ‘They said you won prom queen,’ and I was like: ‘Are you being serious?’” she said in an on-camera interview with NBC4.
Still, the Homestead High School student said she doesn't necessarily see her gender identity as a point of difference.
“I just like to think of myself as a normal person," she said - "but at the same time I realise that I do have a different quirk to me."
While almost everyone was supportive of her campaign to win prom queen, there were those who made their disapproval known online.
"Do you mean king?" she recalled one student writing on social media.
“I didn’t win prom queen for being a transgender girl; I won prom queen for being Nikko Nelson,” she told local broadcasters WISN.
Speaking on camera, Nelson's mother reflected on her daughter's journey, which began, in part, when she decided she wanted to wear a dress to school in 8th grade.
Nikko Nelson appears on camera following her win. Source: NBC4
“This was before Caitlyn Jenner, this is before everything was in the news and we really didn’t [know much.]" She said.
She continued: "Nikko kind of educated us about it."
