Following complaints of over crowding and long wait times for tutors, the Shell Tutorial Center on the first floor of Middleton Library is set to undergo expansion within the next two months.
Director of the Center for Academic Success Melissa Brocato said the expansion should be completed by the end of the summer and will increase the Shell Tutorial Center by one third in size.
“We are crowded,” Brocato said. “Students last semester were getting very frustrated because of the wait times and because the center was packed to the gills.” 
The Shell Tutorial Center currently has space to hold about 60 students, and the expansion will allow for the seating of about 40 more students.
Brocato said the Shell Tutorial Center has established itself as a necessity for students, and tutoring has been linked to student retention. The Center received more than 28,000 visits last year. 
The Shell Tutorial Center was created in 2009 after being initiated by Student Government in response to student demand for an area where they would be able to receive help with their studies.
The additional space will allow for more students to visit the center and receive help disciplines like math, chemistry, physics, biological sciences, accounting, engineering and various languages, according to the Center for
Academic Success website.
Brocato said the plan is to hire more student tutors as long as the budget allows it.
Dean of LSU Libraries Stanley Wilder said work has begun in order to make room for the expansion.
Workers have started to clear the stacks along the back wall of Middleton on the first floors, Wilder said.
The extra space also will be used to house evening supplemental instruction sessions Academic Support associate director Susan Saale said.
“With renovations to Patrick F. Taylor it is becoming harder and harder to find space on campus for supplemental instruction session,” Saale said. “We believe using the extra space in that capacity will have great benefit to
students.”
Saale said the new renovations will not affect the Shell Tutorial Center’s current operations, and students will not be inconvenienced.
She said the Shell Tutorial Center has seen a massive influx of students over the years. Nearly 3,000 student visits have been recorded since the beginning of the spring semester.
Kinesiology freshman Jeffrey Wittenbrink said he uses the tutorial center once or twice a week, and it has been an integral part of his academic success. He said the expansion will have a positive impact in attracting students to the center.
“If it’s bigger, it will have more line of sight, and more people will know it’s there,” Wittenbrink said. “You also have the illusion that more people are using it, so people feel like it’s OK to do it.”