A country girl (Simone Berriau) finds work as a chorus girl in Paris, gets embroiled with a bad egg, and then finds true love with a good-looking milkman.
When her father files bankruptcy and then dies, Rose's fiancé jilts her; she takes a job as a maid in a Montmartre kindergarten with 150 poor children. Rose gives each child loving attention, and soon she's their favorite. An especially needy child is Marie, a prostitute's daughter. Rose and she bond, and Marie is jealous of all attentions paid Rose, especially those of Dr. Libois, the school's physician. When Rose inadvertently guides the children through the educational experiment of a visiting scholar, and then discloses she has a college degree and is working beneath her station, the principal wants to fire her. Is there any way she can stay? And what will happen to Marie?
Hotel des Etudients (Student's Hotel) was the great Tourjansky's sole directorial contribution of 1932. The scene is a Parisian rooming house, catering to students of both sexes. The heroine has a brief affair with a handsome young man, emerging from the experience a little wiser and a lot sadder. Her reputation ruined, the girl seems destined for the oblivion of the streets. But the boy finally realizes the harm he's caused, and in the last few minutes of the film finally does the "right thing." The critical consensus was that the film might have been better had their been fewer fake "exterior" sets and more genuine location filming.