By the end the Spanish period the Chinese mestizos had disappeared as a separate group. The gremios were abolished and the children of mixed Chinese-Filipino marriages now were seen as either Filipino or Chinese. In the 20th century, as many Chinese women began to come to the Philippines, intermarriage rates probably decreased for a time. But after World War II, increasing contact between Chinese and Malay Filipino youth, especially in universities, has maintained a considerable level of intermarriage and thereby a substantial body of mestizos who are sometime the majority in Chinese school. But they occupy no special formal status with reference either to the Chinese or Filipino societies.