When Samuel B. Shaw '99 arrives back at Harvard from an extended spring break at home on April 3, he probably won't be thinking about April Fool's Day pranks.

But the Holworthy resident's roommates have been busy planning his welcome back to school April Fool's style.

The three roommates say they have organized about 50 people, and possibly the Harvard Band, to greet Shaw with banners and a parade at Johnston Gate.

"We're going for several hundred [people] chanting, 'Welcome back Sam,'" says Jonathan L. Lester '99, one of Shaw's roommates.

"We've talked to a couple of the band representatives and they're supposed to be discussing [whether they can play for the parade]. But we haven't heard back from them yet," Lester admits.

And if their ploy doesn't work?

"Our back-up plan is to get him arrested by the Harvard police," Lester says.

At Harvard, where few students seem to have the time or inclination to plot April Fool's schemes, this plan is the most elaborate described by students interviewed yesterday.

Indeed, Lester complains he is disappointed by Harvard's meager April Fool's Day spirit. He and his roommates, Tobias N. Nanda '99 and Ethan E. Thurow '99, say they are determined to inject more silliness into the "studious" atmosphere on campus.

"We're trying to up the stakes a little bit," he says.

In what they say is an ongoing attempt to liven up Harvard, Lester, Nanda and Thurow have played pranks on their friends throughout the school year. According to Lester, most of their jokes involve moving around the furniture of friends who are out of town.

"We just like to scheme," Lester says. "I think that counts as extracurricular."

These roommates weren't the only ones on campus who schemed yesterday against friends and fellow students.

"It would be a great prank if you set everybody's clocks back an hour, but it's too serious to miss class here at Harvard," says Jonathan E. Simpson '99, who had mulled over the idea of tampering with his roommates' clocks.

The clock trick seems to be a common gag employed by Harvard students. Bill S. Triant '99 tried to set his roommates' alarm clocks forward an hour, but according to another roommate, F. Edward Boas '99, his plot failed.

Triant successfully moved the clock of roommate Sanjay K. Menon '99 ahead.

But then, overwhelmed by ambition, he crept into the sleeping Menon's room a second time to set it even farther ahead.

But according to Boas, Menon had been awake the whole time.

Dodging the stodgy stereotype of Harvard professors, some faculty members also participated in the day's pranks.

Many students were not amused when their professors celebrated April Fool's Day by announcing ghastly assignments, springing pop quizzes and moving up due dates for take-home exams.

Daryn H. David '99 was grim when her Expository Writing 11: "Tragic Justice" preceptor told her class to write a Greek trilogy over spring break.

The epics are thousands of pages long.

Luckily, the assignment turned out to be an early April Fool's Day joke, as David's preceptor informed the class five minutes later