The accountability system at present encourages a focus on attendance because funding is tied to contact hours. For the most part that attendance is limited to the classroom. The NCSALL study suggests that these ways of defining or measuring persistence may discourage other kinds of learning activities. A broader definition of persistence holds much promise for those learners who, for a variety of reasons, cannot go on to post secondary and will therefore need to be redirected. For learners whose goal is employment, it opens up exciting possibilities for collaboration with other agencies. This issue is explored more fully in the Protocol.

The NSCALL Adult Persistent Study interviewed 150 learners to discover what helped them persist in their studies and what hindered them. Learners’ responses were carefully analyzed and trends were recorded. Based on these trends and additional research, four important supports to persistence were identified:

• awareness and management of the positive and negative forces that help and hinder persistence
• self-efficacy (represents the feeling of being able to accomplish a task within the context of the literacy program)
• establishment of a goal by the student
• progress toward reaching a goal

The NSCALL study suggests that a combination of all four supports promotes student persistence. These supports, or aspects of these supports, already exist in LBS college programs. In the past few years, there has been an increased focus in the area of goalsetting as part of implementing a learner-centred, goal-directed, outcomes-based model of learning. Programs have experienced many challenges and successes making the transition to this new model. (Barber, 2001) They have also experienced success. By using supports programs we’re already familiar with, we felt we could provide practitioners with an opportunity to reflect on how various aspects of their program were working.