On the Beat:

There's no getting around it. Harvard cops do eat doughnuts and drink coffee, admits officer Alex Kordis of the Harvard University Police Department (HUPD).

Kordis says there's a reason for the stereotyped behavior, however. "You need whatever gets you going," he says, adding, "Besides, it's not just police officers. Plumbers and electricians eat more doughnuts."

And Kordis' partner, Officer Bob J. Kotowski, notes, "You need [the coffee] to wake yourself up, especially if you have a 6-12 [p.m. shift] and have to get up for an 8 a.m. court session."

But that's not all they do.

During the course of a three hour long squadcar interview, the officers were called to check on an alarm triggered at the Freshman Dean's Office. It turned out to have been set off accidentally by an office staffer leaving late at night.

Later, the friendly cruise turned into a car chase, when Kotowski noticed a car with a driver whose baseball cap was barely visible above the steering wheel.

"Looks like a 13-year-old," Kotowski said.

While Kotowski trailed the car, Kordis called the station to ask, "Can you read an S and L on an 874 Pirate Delta Golf?"

Translated from policespeak, this phrase means "Can you check the computer listing on car license plate number 874-PDG? It might be a stolen vehicle," Kordis explained.

In fact, the driver turned out to be a small, baseball cap-sporting woman. But police officers can never let their guard down, Kotowski says.

"You can't be lulled into complacency because in the next minute and a half, something could happen," he warns.

At the same time, Kotowski advises his partner, a recent graduate of the police academy, that an officer cannot "go in like a lion and come out like a lamb."

"You have to go in easy, make sure you get all the facts," he says.

For instance, if an officer is stopping a fight between two men on the street, he should not pin down the presumed assailant without first taking the time to "count one two three," calm down and assess the situation. Pinning down the victim by mistake would allow the mugger to escape, he says.

Kotowski and Kordis chat comfortably while sitting behind a dashboard that looks like it came from Cape Canaveral--with controls ranging from the usual "sirens" and "rotating lights" to one labelled, mysteriously, "take down wig wag."

At their feet is a giant ring weighted down by about 300 keys to campus buildings. The visitor is separated from the officers by a plexiglass window and metal bars, and is flanked on both sides by doors that cannot be opened from the inside.

"It's actually pretty easy to operate," says Kotowski of the imposing vehicle. "But don't tell anybody else that."

Kordis, a newcomer to the HUPD, is one of 10 officers hired by the department earlier this month. Previously, he worked at a law firm, a background he says he has found valuable in learning about questions of law and ethics in police work.

As he nears the end of his first month cruising the campus and surrounding areas, Kordis says he has come to realize that the job of a police officer can often be far from glamorous and social.

"It's tough...It's all business," he says, noting, "We even eat lunch alone because everone's on a different schedule."

When an officer is out on patrol, Kordis says, he or she is only likely to see a fellow officer if called in four backup. "You are not out there to socialize. You are mainly thinking of safety," he says.

Kotowski, who is married, says the job's demanding schedule has definitely affected his personal life.

"Every cop would say [to a spouse], `How about in three weeks we can go out on a Friday night?'" Kotowski says. "It doesn't make your better half very happy, but you still have bills to pay," he adds.

Kordis, who is unmarried, says he is "adjusting" to 4-12 p.m. shifts and 8 a.m. court sessions but that they are certainly "a downer" on his social life.

A little help from modern technology has enabled him to maintain his night life as much as possible. Kordis says he now carries a beeper so that he can arrange where to meet his brother and friends at the end of a shift.

In addition to the challenging schedule, Kordis also faced the difficult task of familiarizing himself with all the streets and buildings of a large university.

"It's pretty tough to get all of the buildings down," Kordis says. "But if you get a call there, you'll definitely learn the building."

The process of learning how to navigate the campus is similar for police rookies and for first-year students, Kotowski points out. "Except this time, there is a time factor," he says. "Sometimes, amidst the stress, you just draw a blank."

A good sense of humor seems to be essential for officers to remain enthusiastic about their work.

During the drive, Kotowski pulled up in front of the Cambridge fire station to chat for a while with a guard.

At another stop, Kordis loaned a cassette tape to a rookie officer on a walking beat inside Harvard Yard.

And of course, a dynamic duo would not be complete without the occasional friendly sparring.

"The rookie is always asking, `What do I do next?'" Kotowski says.

"The rookie is always the better looking one," retorts Kordis.

Asked how they felt about having to watch over college students, the officers say they have found Harvard students to be "a pretty good bunch of kids."

"We're not that much older," says Kotowski. "We kind of know where they're coming from. As long as you give [students] respect, they will respect you back."

Harvard students generally abide by requests from the police, the officers say.

"99.99 percent of the time people are mature enough to see our point," Kotowski says. "We're not here to break up parties. We just want to make sure that one person's fun is not another person's headache."

So far, Kotowski's most memorable experience as an HUPD officer has been an incident that he witnessed near the Radcliffe Quad.

Kotowski, who was out of uniform, encountered a group of students even further from appropriate dress than him.

"Five students streaked by," Kotowski says. "I wasn't going to tackle them. Had I been in uniform, I would've had to stop them."

"I don't think they had their I.D.'s on them at the time, though," he adds.