Creative Compromises

Unlike the last major renovation of the House system, renovation of the first-year dorms began after ADA had been passed--and the Yard solution is a prime example of how FAS must compromise competing concerns of cost, students' needs and historic preservation.

"It's a huge issue in terms of balancing historic buildings...with the needs of students who deserve and earn a chance to be here," says Dean of Freshmen Nathans, who was thrown into the renovation project as soon as she arrived at Harvard in the early 1990s, just as construction was about to get underway.

Harvard put off renovating the Yard dorms, since it would have been too expensive and time consuming to make each one ADA- compliant.

Instead, the College developed a solution that Nathans calls "brilliant"--it asked the MAAB to consider the dorms as several clusters of buildings which all served the same function.

So long as at least one dorm within each of the clusters was accessible, Harvard proposed, then the needs of disabled students were being adequately served. Thayer, Weld, and Greenough would be made accessible to students, while some other dorms--such as Grays, Hollis, and Mass. Hall--would remain totally inaccessible.

"That was a very important step in allowing us to renovate the freshman dorms," Randall says. "Without it, they couldn't have done it."

In Thayer, the College took down three major structural walls that had divided the building into entryways. Adding an elevator, instituting hallways and configuring some suites for disabled students created a fully accessible living space.