Call for papers – Assessing the impact of extended out-of-home care on the pathways and outcomes for young people transitioning from care in Australia

Young people transitioning from forms of out-of-home care (OOHC) such as foster, kinship and residential group home care (often termed care leavers or care-experienced young people), are globally a vulnerable group. Many experience unsupported transitions to adulthood, resulting in limited life chances and opportunities and longterm social exclusion. Some are exposed to experiences of homelessness, poor mental health and involvement in the criminal justice system. A disproportionate number of care leavers in Australia come from First Nations backgrounds, which is also the case in Canada and New Zealand.

Until the advent of the Home Stretch campaign in 2017, most Australian jurisdictions neglected to provide any guaranteed support to care leavers for accessing core needs, such as housing, health care, education and employment, once they turned 18 years of age. However, that campaign persuaded all eight Australian states and territories to introduce a safety net of mandated support for most care leavers aged 18–21 years. Extended care creates a potential for less accelerated transitions to adulthood that, in part, duplicates the more gradual transitions typical of most other young adults in the community, and enables care leavers to develop supportive relationships with responsible adults and social and community networks and connections that can assist them to access key pathways to further education, training and employment.

Nevertheless, the impact of these policy and service innovations remains tentative. Most of the programs are still very new, and none of the jurisdictions has completed formal evaluations that verify the effectiveness of extended care in advancing improved outcomes. Nor do we know how those care leavers already aged 21 years or above, who have graduated from extended care programs, are faring. This is an ideal time for researchers, practitioners and policy advocates to examine the effect of the extended care programs on care-leaver pathways and outcomes across the eight Australian jurisdictions in areas such as housing, education and employment, health care (including mental health systems), criminal justice and social networks and relationships. We also welcome examinations of the specific cultural and identity needs and experiences of First Nations care leavers.

Please submit abstracts – inclusive of primary research, policy analysis, evaluation or implementation of extended care programs – of approximately 100 words by Friday 25 September to:

Melissa Storey, Children Australia
melissa.storey@cfecfw.org.au