Prom has historically been a bastion of stereotypical gender roles. The girl in a beautiful gown, the boy in a tux. Prom king is a guy, prom queen is a girl. But in 2018, more and more students are pushing for gender neutral prom courts, signaling how millennials are treating fundamental questions about identity and inclusion.

"Prom has reflected American adolescence, and it usually contains and magnifies the features of whatever is going on with that age cohort at the time. As the millennium changed over, and we're in a different generation now, there's just much more acceptance of gender fluidity," said Ann Anderson, author of High School Prom: Marketing, Morals and the American Teen.

If prom is a rehearsal for life, as Anderson said some would suggest, then many teens are sending clear signals as to what kind of world they'd like to live in as adults. "We just want the same opportunities," Hebert said. "We want equality. We understand that you may not have the same views as us, you may not understand what we're going through but we just want you to be open, and give us the opportunities that y'all have."