As LSU welcomes over 5,800 freshman, they look to improve their livelihood and success here by requiring all first year students to live on campus.
“It’s all about student success. Students that live on campus have a higher retention rate, a higher graduation rate and do better academically,” said Steve Waller, Assistant Vice President for Residential Life and Housing.
Students like Misha Gunaldo feel living on campus gives them a better opportunity to acclimate to their surroundings.
“Definitely easy to walk to class, you have a lot of close proximity areas you can go to like the dining halls. You also get a way better sense of direction on LSU’s campus that you might necessarily not have if you were off campus and didn’t have to walk to places everyday,” said freshman student Misha Gunaldo. 
Misha also feels living in a dorm increases her likelihood of going to class, and there is a direct connection between class attendance and higher GPA.
“Living on campus makes me want to go to class more because then I don’t have to worry about trafiic getting to my classes. I can just walk and it’s not that far of a commute,” Gunaldo said.
However, getting all freshman to live on campus has been a goal 12 years in the making.
“First Year Housing Expectation is not just a new idea.The University has had the desire to do this as far back as 2006. Our challenege was we didn’t have the capacity to house the class. With the completion of Spruce Hall this year, it gave us the capacity to be able to do that. So, the University decided to implement what was approved back in 2006,” Waller said.
With plans to build more dorms in the future, LSU hopes to keep accommodating the growing freshman class.