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A TWENTIETH-CENTURY COSMOS
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gifted students, and Boucher developed a long list of stories that he regularly recited about the gifted nature of his students in the College. The discussion leaders who were among the younger faculty found themselves caught up in the work, and they liked it. Bill Halperin, who later became a distinguished historian of modern Europe and as a young man taught one of the discussion sections of the social sciences general course, reported that [m]any of the students were surprisingly alert and sophisticated, and at times the discussions were extremely suggestive and outspoken. . . . A very considerable number of the students have responded to the challenge by developing very excellent study habits. It is my impression that the New Plan students not only do more work than their old-plan predecessors, but approach their academic problems with greater alertness and understanding. The necessity of integrating and synthesizing data garnered from various fields of learning has provided the more intelligent and industrious students with that intellectual experience which, under existing educational conditions, to a large extent is reserved for post-graduate study.98 Similarly, Mary Gilson commented on the excitement of teaching in such an open-ended course: Surely no one can criticize the New Plan for regimenting or routinizing the instructor. On the contrary, it furnishes rich opportunities for initiative and experimentation, and no 98. Halperin to Boucher, May 27, 1933, Box 8, folder 2, ibid.