East European Jewish school children are described as such by ambivalent school teacher: “They are mentally alert, colorful, intelligent, the backbone of my class, but they can be an insufferable nuisance because of their constant desire to distinguish themselves.” Thus, even though memories of childhood often depicted the school years as full of warm and tender events, this was not always the case because they were often made fun of because of their accents and their eagerness to excel.

As a result, de facto segregation, which is segregation that occurs by tradition or demography rather than law,  actually provided comfort to immigrant parents. The parents, as well as the teachers argued that this made it easier to teach English to a class where all the students spoke the same foreign language.