Displaying 1 - 7 of 7
Abstract
This paper addresses the conceptualization of ‘outcomes’ for care experienced people through an in-depth longitudinal study of 75 young adults in Denmark, England and Norway. ‘Outcome’ studies have played a crucial role in raising awareness of the risk of disadvantage that care experienced people face, across a variety of domains including education and employment. These studies may have an unintended consequence, however, if care experienced people are predominantly viewed, and studied, through a problem-focused lens. The danger is that policy and research neglects other –…
Abstract
This descriptive policy analysis examines the position of infants’ rights in the family service orientated child welfare systems of Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden when being placed in out-of-home care. Its focus is on the contexts of, and legal procedures for, removing babies from home into public care. Children under the age of one year are taken into public care mainly through voluntary and emergency measures. Analysis of the development over a decade displays big intra-country differences in the prevalence of infant removal, varying from 2 per 1000 to 8 per 1000. The scant…
Abstract
This article explores how children living in foster care create senses of belonging across diverse family relationships. It draws on video diaries made by 11 Danish children living in foster care. For the analysis, we have selected two video diaries, made by two girls, aged 12 and 15 years, who live in foster care and have regular contact with their birth family. The girls differ in their senses of belonging but both reflectively negotiate this across their family relationships creating more or less emotional, physical and functional attachments with their foster care and birth…
Abstract
Most countries provide aftercare for foster care alumni either through specific targeted programs or by making foster care or related services available to the youth after they have aged out of foster care. Yet we have limited evidence of the effects of this type of care, especially from non-US contexts. My study tests whether an expansion of the Danish aftercare scheme in 2001 affects later outcomes of foster care alumni. This expansion raised the age limit for eligibility for aftercare from 20 years to 22 years, and created an increased focus on availability of this type of…
Abstract:
This working paper has reviewed cross-national datasets for the general population and available national data and other relevant (grey and academic) literature concerned with young people in care and care leavers in the three study countries. The aim is not evaluative; i.e. not to determine which country does ‘best’. Rather, the paper seeks to provide a situated understanding of the multi-dimensional complexity of transitions out of ‘care’ and of ‘outcomes’ for children and young people with experience of care, and hence to enable a contextualised understanding of the diver-sity…
Abstract
Not much research focuses on how parents perceive and experience child protection practice although the voices of service users are important in the development of social work within Child Welfare Services. This article contributes to a growing body of research that takes the user perspective as its point of departure when conducting research in social work. Drawing on a qualitative study, this article explores how 17 parents have experienced assessment processes in Denmark. Several studies indicate that parents who by themselves initiate child protection assessment have a greater…
Abstract:
The transition from care to independent life is difficult for former foster care youth. The experience of aging out of care may be troublesome and accentuate problems already experienced. The youth face a lot of setbacks and rejections during the transition, resulting in a high risk of unemployment and a low educational level. This is referred to as disappointing and/or an attainment gap. There is, however, still a lack of knowledge as to what creates these disappointing results and how the youth may overcome influences of their foster care history and their experiences while in…