Retention
What can we do on a personal level to help with student retention?
I let them know what they have already accomplished. They graduated high school, stayed out of trouble, and made the big step of starting their career. Let them know there are a lot of people his age that still have no idea what to do. This a big step of their life.
Thinking of confinds of rules, striving to make myself approchable plays a huge role on students impression of us. Also each day I end with some experiance learned "history" that illustrates curent or near future task. It seems if student may have not been thrilled thus far he may peak his intrest tomorrow and return for more.
I would say you can not do much with the students on a personal level as we are all governed by professional standards. However, we can introduce a personal touch to our school, we can follow/change the culture of a school by showing we care by attending graduations, student appreciation events, classroom celebrations, etc... All too often, we present such events to our students to show we care but instructional staff see this as a time to grade papers, make tests, etc.. instead of enjoying the celebrations with the students.