Noise Rocks Classes at HLS

Workers at the Harvard Law School continued construction this week on a five-story, 23,000 square foot office and classroom building that officials say will significantly increase the school's resources.

But the construction, not scheduled for completion for another 15 months, drew complaints this week from students who bemoaned the disturbance in the campus' main thoroughfare.

The new facility, rising from a prodigious hole in Holmes Field in front of Harkness Commons, will contain four classrooms, 58 offices and a student computer lab.

Students said that construction is located unfortunately close to existing classrooms.

"It's pain in the neck," said John E. Tobin, graduate student in international law. "I can hardly hear the professor with the racket going on."

"This is a beautiful park," he added. "They're pulling down the trees and cluttering the landscape."

Heather Schildge, another law student, said the school "should have made more provisions for classes going on."

"It's already noisy in large classes and this makes it very hard to hear. Also, it's been hot and you want to open the windows," she said.

But law school officials maintain that they have been careful to accommodate everyone.

"We are very conscious and as observant as possible of people's concerns," said Sandra S. Coleman, administrative dean of the law school. "There has been a lot of planning."

Coleman said classroom's were sound-proofed and the construction workday ordered to begin at 8 a.m. rather than 7 a.m.

Coleman also said that only one-quarter of Holmes Field will be affected and that the finished site will be extensively landscaped.

The building, now referred to only as the Holmes Field Building, is part of an estimated $150 million drive to "improve the educational climate of the School," Dean Robert C. Clark said in a statement at the outset of the drive. Eighty million dollars has been raised to date.

In addition to new construction, the funds will pay for the modernization of four buildings and 12 new endowed faculty chairs.

Also, the school intends to boost student financial aid and increase funds available to various curricular programs.

"We seek to prepare the school for education in the 21st century by creating new flexible space and reorganizing current space to accommodate new faculty, technology and teaching methods," the statement read.