Figure 1.--This is a class at the Ecole Gambetta school in 1947. I'm not sure just what class this was, but it looks to be some of the older boys. We see mostly French boys, but there are several Algerian children as well.

It is a little difficult to tell, but the children look mostly like French children. We do see, however, some children that are clearly Algerian. This shows that the school admitted Algerian children, but that apparebntly few Algerian parents wanted to send their children to French schools. The language may have been a factor as the schools like the Ecole Gambetta were taught in France. There may well have been other factors which kert the Algerian children from the school. Hopefully readers will provide us some background information here.

A French reader tells us, "In Algeria in the years after World War II, school was compulsory intill 14 years of age old for all children . This rule was respected in city but much less in the country villages. The school was the principal factor for the integration this people. In the larger cities like Oran, all the persons were able to speak French, although many Algerian families spoke Arab at home. When a child was not in the school , his parents could have some trouble. It's true , the French school is rather hard, and the Algerian children were not very good pupils. Here the fact the schools were conducted in French was a factor. In addition many Algerian children came from families in which the parents were not educated. School was open to the Algerian children. Algerian pupil could enter in secondary school and there was no charge for the pupils. Today most of the Algerian population can speak French. Secondary schools are taught in both French and Arabic."

Looking at the children, it seems to us that most of them are French rather than Arabic. In many cases this id difficult go assess. One factor here is probably that the French population was concentrated in the cities.