Why do some of adult learners successfully accomplish their learning while the others drop out? This has been an important question in the field of adult learning. For a long time researchers have been exploring this subject around learning barriers as well as motivations. Not until lately did some of the adult and distance scholars start to pay attention to the question of why some of the adult students could successfully push through their learning process even if they are in a disadvantaged situation. Thus, Learner Retention has become one of the important themes to discuss in order to understand more about how to assist learners to persist through their learning. The main purpose of this paper is to explore how adult learners persist through their learning and factors that might have influences on them. Adult teachers and NOU students (including those who already graduated and those who dropped out) were interviewed and surveyed. Concluding from those data and content of interviews, this paper set a model that describes how adult learners retain through their learning process and some suggestions are made for better student learning support policies.