Midvale » Everyone knows that cliques reign over school cafeterias.

The jocks rule from one corner, the smart kids do their homework in another, and the theater kids cling to their own tables.

But some Utah schools tried Tuesday to change that with a simple idea: they asked students, for one day, to sit with different people at lunch. At least 14 Utah schools, along with nearly 2,900 others worldwide, made the request as part of Mix it Up at Lunch Day, a program of the Southern Poverty Law Center's Teaching Tolerance project.

"It's fun to see who you can meet in one day," said Shelby Page, a ninth-grader at Midvale Middle School, one of the schools that asked students to mix it up Tuesday. "There's people you see in the hall, but you never actually talk."

Midvale is a diverse school that, like most others, has its share of cliques that divide along ethnic, economic and social lines. Minority students made up about 38 percent of the school's population last school year. Midvale is a magnet school for the district's accelerated learning program, meaning many students come from outside the school's boundaries. The school also has many students who qualify for free and reduced price lunches.

"One thing about this school is there's a lot of groups, and they usually don't go out of their way to talk to someone new," said ninth-grader Akina Bosley, a leader of the school's Project Change group, which helped organize the lunch event.

But Midvale students truly attempted to leave their comfort zones Tuesday.

Audrey Huo sat with ninth-graders even though she usually sits with other eighth-graders.

Seventh-grader Mercedes Kent sat with a girl from her theater class, whom she hadn't really talked to before.

And eighth-grader Courtney Eborn sat with a student who recently moved to the school.

"When [students] are in cliques, they see everyone as different," Eborn said.

Lecia Brooks, director of the Teaching Tolerance project, said many adults might be surprised to learn how eager some students are to make new friends. She said the event gives students an excuse to break through barriers that keep them from befriending others.

"I think it's liberating for students in a lot of ways adults don't even recognize," Brooks said. She said it could also lead to safer schools as divisions "could create kind of an environment that's ripe for bullying and harassment."

As part of Mix it Up at Lunch Day, teachers at Midvale handed out surveys to students about cliques. Teacher Mandy George, who advises the school's Project Change student group, said her students named language, where they live and clothes as things that create "group boundaries" at Midvale.

George said she's hoping the Mix it Up at Lunch Day, which the school plans to do once a month for the rest of the year, will help students see that those barriers are not insurmountable.