Foster Care

Since 1999 there has been a renewed effort addressing the challenges youth face exiting foster care in adolescence, yet outcomes for most youth are still indicating heartbreaking results and it is still not clear what more is needed. Presented is a study addressing what is needed for successful transition. Three major themes emerged; youth focused practice, need for collaboration and

Translated in Dutch by SWP publisher Paul Roosenstein, from:
Rygaard, N.P. (2021): Climate Change, Migration, Urbanization, and the Mental Health of Children at Risk in the European Union -
A Discussion of the Need for Large Scale Interventions
European Psychologist (2021), 26(3), 204–211
2021 Hogrefe Publishing

This paper deals with the contact and relationship youth have with staff while in care and after emancipation and examines the young adults' needs in contacting staff after leaving care. The study was conducted through 60 interviews with young adults ages 21–26 who emancipated from residential settings in Israel. Results showed that most youth report having had a meaningful staff member in care and that 62% were in contact with staff after their transition to independent living for both emotional and practical needs that could not always be answered by staff. One of the study's conclusions is that despite their departure staff's relationship with these young adults continues informally years after. However, without formal recognition of the place staff have in the lives of aged-out youth, no resources are invested in training them to properly meet the young adults' needs. The discussion highlights the need for an integrative approach that sees residential settings and staff as a meaningful part in the continuity from care to independent living by supporting aged-out youth's gradual transition to adult life.

Individual and ecological research suggests that rising unemployment may affect the incidence of violence through two countervailing mechanisms suggested by frustration-aggression theory. The first, or provocation effect, assumes increased violence among persons who feel anger because they believe their job loss was arbitrary. The second, or inhibition effect, posits less violence among employed persons who attempt to reduce their chances of job loss by curtailing behavior objectionable to employers. The literature also reports that these mechanisms affect victimization measured as foster care sought by the state for abused children. The foster care finding, although consistent with theory and important for basic as well as applied reasons, arises from methods that cannot rule out several rival hypotheses. We revisit this research and apply improved methods to test the reported association in Los Angeles and San Francisco counties. We find that, as implied by the provocation and inh...

The foster care system is not absolved from its role and complicity in the expansion of the shadow carceral state in the U.S. Educational researchers and social scientists alike concerned with the academic, social, and life outcomes and experiences of Black youth in foster care and other racially/ethnically minoritized groups must broaden the aperture in their work to account for the ways which carceral logics permeate the multiply marginalizing structures and systems in which they are positioned.

Foster care alumni experience a number of challenges related to accessing and completing post-secondary education, however little is known about the programs that currently exist in the United States that support this group of students in college. This study sought to build on previous work that calls for the need to develop programs to support foster care alumni in higher education and to obtain a better understanding of the characteristics of existing programs and the perceived programmatic and student challenges as reported by program
directors and staff, faculty, and researchers. Eight-one program directors, staff, and researchers in 22 states participated in an online survey about their perceptions of challenges related to programs supporting foster care alumni in college and challenges students experienced. The survey also elicited information about program and
student characteristics. Results indicate several challenges related to financial support, student engagement, student housing, and helping students manage family and personal issues. This information created the foundation for a discussion about implications for future research, programs, practice, and policy related to foster care alumni in higher education.

On March 16, 1996, the author interviewed her mother, Beth Tillmann, about Beth's parents' divorce and her life as a foster child. From detailed notes taken during this phone conversation and from family stories told to the author throughout her life, the author constructed a narrative titled "A Home of Her Own." Its structure and tone mimic the way her mother speaks about the dissolution of her family of origin and her attachments to and separations from those who tried to help her rebuild a sense of home. After the story is a discussion of what narrative representations of loss offer the writer, the subject, and the reader.

As the COVID-19 virus began to spread in the United States of America, states' child welfare administrators and policymakers responded differently. Some states implemented more restrictive policies, some less or did not require many restrictions (i.e., stay at home orders or masking in public spaces). Video-based online focus groups with foster parents in four states utilized a consensual qualitative approach to identify themes relating to foster parenting during COVID-19 and understand how policies related to COVID-19 restrictions affected their caregiving decisions.  Themes that emerged included pathways to foster parenting pre-pandemic, the impact of COVID-19 on both foster parents, children in care, and foster parents' ability to understand the broader importance of their caregiving. While participants in all of the states reported similar experiences relating to the need for resources and support and the challenge of managing both work and remote education for their children,
those in states with restrictive policies were more likely to report pandemic-specific concerns including a lack of agency communication or case progress, the mental health toll on foster children in their care and their concerns about accepting new placements. Implications for policy and practice are discussed.

This brief explores ways policy levers can be utilized to better support students from foster care who are attending college in the time of COVID-19 by examining three studies and applying lessons learned to federal policy development and implementation.

While the need to provide appropriate mental health services to children in foster care is well recognized, there is little information on administrative barriers to assuring that such services are provided. This article presents results from a national survey of mental health agencies to profile their awareness of currently available practice standards, the roles these standards play in guiding practice of mental health agencies, common reimbursement strategies in use for mental health services, and collaborations between mental health and child welfare agencies that enhance children’s access to appropriate mental health care. Implications and recommendations for mental health policymakers are discussed.

Although the term attachment disorder is ambiguous, attachment therapies are increasingly used with children who are maltreated, particularly those in foster care or adoptive homes. Some children described as having attachment disorders show extreme disturbances. The needs of these children and their caretakers are real. How to meet their needs is less clear. A number of attachment-based treatment and parenting approaches purport to help children described as attachment disordered. Attachment therapy is a young and diverse field, and the benefits and risks of many treatments remain scientifically undetermined. Controversies have arisen about potentially harmful attachment therapy techniques used by a subset of attachment therapists. In this report, the Task Force reviews the controversy and makes recommendations for assessment, treatment, and practices. The report reflects American Professional Society on the Abuse of Children's (APSAC) position and also was endorsed by the Amer...

Existing literature suggests that youth with disabilities are known to be at increased risk of maltreatment in the form of abuse and/or neglect.  Little is known, however, about the experiences of youth with disabilities who are living in foster care or who are supervised by child protection authorities.  This study establishes a baseline estimate of the prevalence of youth with disabilities living in foster care, documents reasons for child protection system involvement, identifies placement types while youth are in care and explores case outcomes. This cross-sectional, exploratory study draws on data from the 2012 Adoption and Foster Care Reporting System (AFCARS) for foster youth in 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico.  A sample of youth with disabilities (N=36,492) and a comparison group without disabilities (N=601,539) were identified. Findings about demographics, reasons for child removal, foster care placements, permanency planning goals and case outcomes are presented. Findings have implications for the prevention the removal of youth from caregivers, the need for family supports to prevent foster care involvement, the promotion of community inclusion of foster youth while in foster care and the need for inter-system collaboration at the transitional age stage.

a b s t r a c t a r t i c l e i n f o This study compares self-reported readiness to engage in college between a sample of 81 college freshmen who aged out of foster care prior to or while attending a large four-year public university and the national freshman population. Results indicate that students from foster care are significantly different from their non-foster-care peers in their readiness to engage in college. The results also show that foster youth are less well prepared academically upon entering college and this performance gap persists through the first semester of college. These findings are examined in the context of the current literature on foster youth. Limitations of the study and implications for future research and practice are discussed.

Contemporary models of family adjustment, namely the goodness of fit model and the organizational ecology conceptual frameworks, are limited in their application to the complexities of family foster care. However, the family adjustment and adaptation response (FAAR) model exists as a viable model for research and clinical applications in family foster care. In this article we discuss the FAAR model's relative advantages in understanding family foster placement and review available studies based on specific FAAR model components. Working with foster families using the FAAR model is described. We conclude by discussing research and practice implications derived from family foster placement research based on a FAAR conceptual framework. Finally, a case example involving application of the FAAR model is offered.

This article examines the impact of the Children Act 1908 on longstanding concerns that foster or informally 'adoptive' parents were uniquely likely to murder the children in their care. Making particular reference to the last two high-profile cases of 'baby-farmers' tried for homicide on the Welsh and English Assize circuits (in 1907 and 1919, respectively) it argues that the infant life protection provisions in the 1908 Act had a dramatic and immediate impact on such prosecutions, removing the automatic presumption of malice in cases where fostered or adopted children died in suspicious circumstances.