Social interaction as a function of active intervention in an israeli elementary school

A social integration project was engaged in at Gush Etzion Regional Elementary school at the beginning of the 1984/85 school year. Students of Oriental ethnic origin, residing in low socioeconomic status (SES) and culturally disadvantaged areas, were placed in ethnically heterogeneous first-grade classes. For comparison, students from similar backgrounds were also assigned to two other schools, one ethnically heterogeneous, and one nonintegrative. Several educational and psychological interventions, geared toward promoting social integration, were undertaken at the integrative Gush Etzion school, after which increments on four major factors—social image, social confidence, social acceptance, and social leadership—were measured in beginning- and end-of-year evaluations. The results indicate significantly higher increments in each of the research factors after 1 year of integration-oriented interventions at the Gush Etzion school than at the other two schools, in which no such activities were undertaken. Thus, the integration project contributed to the perceived positive social integration and interethnic relations of the low SES and culturally disadvantaged students.