This preliminary report describes part of NKI-Skolen's planned contribution to a cooperative study on student non-start and early withdrawals in correspondence education, which was created by the Norwegian Association of Correspondence Schools. A project is explained which will examine the organization of the initial phases of a student's correspondence study by assigning students in an experimental group to personal tutors who will integrate the normally-separated administrative, teaching, and counseling tutor functions. A background section provides a research review on the drop-out problem in distance education, non-start and early withdrawals, and student reasons for discontinuation. Further experimental studies with special relevance to the research problems and procedures are briefly presented. Under experimental procedures, the tutors' role in the study is examined in detail. Finally, research design and procedures are explained, including the courses, student selection, questionnaire design and data collection, and a summary of the research problems. A five-page bibliography is included, as well as a questionnaire (in Norwegian) designed for both experimental and control groups, which contains items on correspondence study in general, the tutor's work, and counselling, to contrast their perceptions on different aspects of distance study. (LMM)