The Science and Engineering Library is a safe haven on campus. It is where many students weather long nights studying for midterms and finals and meet up with people from their classes in between exams to discuss homework. It is nearly silent on some floors, and almost loud on others, so it provides a variety of study spaces to a student body that appreciates and uses all 24 hours it’s open, seven days a week.
At least, it was a safe haven until the brick replacement construction project began.
I go to the SEL in between classes nearly every day to try to get some extra work done and avoid walking back and forth between the “academic core” and South Campus. However, I’ve noticed that the days when I go up to the quiet fourth floor, anticipating the work I’ll get done in the silence, there is a constant banging noise that now distracts me.
It’s a banging that overrides whatever music I try to blare in my headphones to cover it up.
And the most annoying part? It’s not just a fellow student annoyingly tapping a pen or a leg to alleviate some of their restlessness.
It’s hammering from yet another campus construction site.
Lindsay Komlanc, Ohio State spokeswoman for Administration and Planning, told me in an email what workers are doing to the building exactly: “Replacing some brick and repairing the horizontal and vertical ‘soft joints’ between the bricks on the exterior of the buildings. We are also doing some maintenance involving the sealant for improved moisture protection.”
This does seem important, and she did also say it will be done in December. That isn’t long, but there are still five weeks of school left, two of which are finals weeks.
BANG BANG BANG. It seems like there’s not much to be done but avoid the SEL this finals season.