Kevin, Follow up and follow up whatever the plan is it will require that you go an extra step and ask the student where they are with the plan. If you have other staff members or faculty onboard with the solution provided for the student team effort helps you as a dedicated faculty member realize that you have done what is required and followed up with the student to find out if they were committed to the plan initially. Is the plan written down or only discussed? How were you held accountable in the real world situation that you had? Our population at career colleges are on their second, third and fourth chance at getting it right often times the follow up and extra nudge is needed in Gen. Ed more than anywhere else, because it is back to basics. Core classes are the meat of what brought them back to school. Reading writing and arithmetic probably was not fun then and is not fun for them now. My first academic dean explained to many that many of the disiplines and methods of teaching used in high school are of more value in career college than what you have been trained to do in Higher Ed. It was a hard lesson for me to learn, but after reading numerous references and research on retention, it makes sense. If you remember your own personal experiences most of us enjoyed learning until fourth or fifth grade when the other lessons learn start to come together, it was not until junior high that we realize the Ming Dynasty really was pretty cool and knew history interested us, so we taught it or read it about or made it a hobby. Our students have not realized their Ming Dynasty or what it took to aquire this power. We have to put ourselves as close to who and where they come from for them to see the light. That is all we can do, the rest is up to them.