Content uploaded by Kim Hokanson
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Kim Hokanson on Apr 09, 2020
Content may be subject to copyright.
233
‘ere are a Lot of Good ings that Come
Out of it at the End’: Voices of Resilience
in Youth Formerly in Foster Care During
Emerging Adulthood
Emerging adulthood, the devel-
opmental stage between ages 18
and 25, presents unique barriers
to former foster youth, who expe-
rience higher rates of unplanned
pregnancy and homelessness and
poorer educational attainment
than their peers during this time.
is study uses interviews with
20 youth formerly in foster care
who exhibit better-than-average
outcomes to explore contextual
aspects of resilience during emerging adulthood, elucidating how
both relational and organizational support contribute to their resil-
iency. Implications for social work policy and practice are discussed.
Kim Hokanson
Boston College School of Social Work
Sarah Elizabeth Neville
Boston College School of Social Work
Samantha Teixeira
Boston College School of Social Work
Erin Singer
JSI Research & Training Institute, Inc.
Stephanie Cosner Berzin
Simmons University
Acknowledgements: e authors wish to thank the program sta at program sites who supported
this project. e authors also are deeply grateful to the young adults who shared their stories and
insights with us. e authors gratefully acknowledge Dr. Scott Easton’s keen eye and encourage-
ment and Cara Antonaccio for her support and feedback. Finally, the authors would like to express
sincere and heartfelt gratitude for Dr. Samantha Teixeira’s tireless and insightful support of the
process of producing this work.
Note: is research did not receive any specic grant from funding agencies in the public, com-
mercial, or nonprot sectors.
Copyright © 2020 CWLA.
For reprints or reproductions, contact Marlene Saulsbury, publications director, at msaulsbury@cwla.org.
Child Welfare Vol. 97, No. 6
234
Young people passing into emerging adulthood face challenges
under the best of circumstances, but for the 20,000 who age out
of foster care in the United States each year, this developmental stage
can be particularly challenging (Arnett, 2004; Child Welfare Informa-
tion Gateway, 2017). While for many of their peers, making experi-
mental decisions and exploring their identities is a “normal” phase of
development, youth formerly in foster care now must either stand on
their own or lean on supports that are tenuous at best, including family
who may have abused and/or neglected them and child welfare sys-
tems that can only provide support under specic conditions. It is not
surprising, then, that outcomes in their rst few years of adulthood
are sometimes grim, with narratives of homelessness, unplanned preg-
nancy, substance use, and poverty dominating the academic literature
(Berzin, Rhodes, & Curtis, 2011; Courtney, Dworsky, Lee, & Raap,
2010; Dworsky & Courtney, 2010a; Dworsky & Courtney, 2010b;
Stewart, Kum, Barth, & Duncan, 2014).
Far less discussed is that many of these youth beat the odds and defy
these narratives. e voices of youth formerly in foster care are often
“conspicuously absent” from the dominant practice of viewing foster
youth through a decit lens (Day, Riebschleger, Dworsky, Damashek, &
Fogarty, 2012, p. 1009). Resilience theory, which posits resilience as
formed by a combination of individual traits and contextual fac-
tors (Benard, 2004; Fergus & Zimmerman, 2005), is a useful tool for
framing how successful youth formerly in foster care overcome their
adversities (Masten, 2018). Burt and Paysnick (2012) call the contex-
tual aspects, including relational and organizational support, “malleable
protective factors” (p. 500), as service providers and policy-makers have
more direct control over them than individual traits. However, many
studies of youth formerly in foster care in emerging adulthood only
examine individual and relational components of resilience (Burt &
Paysnick, 2012; Yates & Grey, 2012).
To ll these gaps, this study addresses the question: What contextual
factors do youth formerly in foster care identify that promote resilience
during emerging adulthood?
Hokanson et al. Child Welfare
235
Background
Youth formerly in foster care lag behind their non-fostered peers in
many traditional measures of success. An estimated 11% to 46% are
homeless at least once before age 26, compared to 4% of the general
population (Berzin, Rhodes, & Curtis, 2011; Dworsky & Courtney,
2010a). About half experience unplanned pregnancy by age 19, com-
pared to 20% nationwide (Dworsky & Courtney, 2010b; Oshima,
Narendorf, & McMillen, 2013). Only about 58% of youth formerly in
foster care complete high school by age 19, compared to 87% of all U.S.
youth (National Conference of State Legislatures, 2019).
Fortunately, some policy changes in recent years have led to improved
outcomes for former foster youth. e 2008 Fostering Transitions to
Success and Increasing Adoptions Act, for example, provided guide-
lines and funding for youth to continue to receive child welfare services
past age 18. Even small increases of time in care during early adulthood
are associated with improved outcomes (Child Trends, 2017; Child
Trends, 2019).
Resilience eory
Despite these challenges, many youth formerly in foster care go on to
lead successful lives. Resilience theory is an applicable framework for
discerning some of the factors involved in doing well despite challenges
(Zimerman, 2013), positing that “assets” (individual characteristics)
and “resources” (contextual resources, including relational and organi-
zational) create resilience by outweighing the impact of risk exposure
(Benard, 2004; Fergus & Zimmerman, 2005).
We identied ten studies that use resilience theory to examine
youths’ experiences of emerging adulthood. Hines, Merdinger, and
Wyatt (2005) interviewed youth formerly in foster care who were in
college, identifying resilience from internal resources (independence
and a determination to have a dierent future) and external resources
(social support and relationships). Hass, Allen, and Amoah (2014),
Child Welfare Vol. 97, No. 6
236
who also interviewed youth formerly in foster care who were in college,
similarly highlighted independence and supportive relationships as
important factors in achieving academic success in the form of attend-
ing college. ese two components were also found to be important by
Jones (2012), who tested a resilience instrument with 97 youth formerly
in foster care. Hass and Graydon (2009) surveyed 44 youth formerly
in foster care who were attending or had graduated from college and
found future orientation and supportive relationships to be sources of
resilience. Two larger quantitative studies (Greeson, Usher, & Grinstein-
Weiss, 2010; Strolin-Goltzman, Woodhouse, Suter, & Werrbach, 2016)
found relationships to be the biggest contributors to resilience.
Overall, research on emerging adulthood for youth formerly in foster
care is in its early stages (Burt & Paysnick, 2012). Few studies on this
population examine better than expected outcomes (Yates & Grey, 2012)
or available resources (Hass & Graydon, 2009). e youth voice itself
is also often overlooked (Day, Riebschleger, Dworsky, Damashek, &
Fogarty, 2012). Among the reviewed studies, the most common opera-
tionalization of resilience was educational attainment. Most mentioned
individual aspects of resilience (Hass, Allen, & Amoah, 2014; Hass &
Graydon, 2009; Hines, Merdinger, & Wyatt, 2005; Jones, 2012), all
mentioned relational support, and only one mentioned organizational
support (Batsche et al., 2014). is study addresses these gaps by asking
the youth themselves about their relational and organizational supports
and by extending the sample of “resilient” youth beyond a sole focus on
those enrolled in college.
Methods
Data Collection
A semi-structured interview protocol was designed to learn about
emerging adults’ experiences in the child welfare system (Berzin,
Singer, & Hokanson, 2014; Singer, Berzin, & Hokanson, 2013). Ques-
tions included, e.g., “How have the people in your life supported you?”
Hokanson et al. Child Welfare
237
and “Who do you feel so close to that it is hard to imagine life without
them?” Boston College’s Institutional Review Board approved the study
protocol. Participants (N = 20) were recruited from two programs serv-
ing current and former foster youth in 2011 and 2012. One supported
youth in college (n = 10) and the other youth ages 17 to 22, regardless
of their college enrollment (n = 10). Any young adult 18 years of age or
older and currently or formerly in foster care was eligible to participate.
ey were recruited through yers and their program sta, who sched-
uled the interviews at their program sites. e researchers reviewed
informed consent forms with each participant, who then signed them.
Participants received $20 gift cards for their participation. Interviews
were conducted, recorded, and transcribed verbatim.
Demographics
Fourteen participants identied as female and six as male, and they
ranged in age from 18 to 21 (mean = 19.35 years). About half (45%)
identied as Black or African American, 15% as Hispanic, 10% as
White, 15% as “mixed,” and 15% as another race (including Cape
Verdean, Haitian, and “African/Moroccan”). Of the sample, 75% had
a high school diploma or GED, 20% were in high school, and 5% (one
respondent) had a ninth grade education and was no longer in school.
e group spent an average of 8.9 years in care. Some 60% of respon-
dents reported having lived in ve or more foster homes. All were still
connected to the child welfare system, and the Massachusetts Depart-
ment of Children and Families (DCF) was providing all but one with
nancial support in the form of housing, tuition, programmatic sup-
port, and in at least ve cases, direct payments.
We label our sample as “resilient” as they exhibited better than
average outcomes for youth formerly in foster care. ey did not self-
identify as resilient. However, they attended college at higher rates; only
one had experienced homelessness in the past two years, and only one,
as compared to about 20% of former foster youth nationally by age 19
(27% by age 21) (Child Trends, 2017). One respondent had a child;
Child Welfare Vol. 97, No. 6
238
nationally, about 12% of foster youth alums have a child by age 19 (27%
by age 21) (Child Trends, 2017).
Analysis
e modied consensual qualitative research (CQR-M) analytic
approach was chosen for its rigor and for its usefulness in explor-
ing “inner experiences,” “data derived from short narrative responses
to questions,” and sample sizes above 15 (Hill, Knox, ompson,
Williams, & Hess, 2005; Bertsch et al., 2014, p. 177). After thor-
oughly reading all 20 transcripts, the rst author did rst-cycle coding
by re-reading ve transcripts and writing down words and sentences
that stood out. She then clustered these codes (Saldaña, 2013), and
nally used resilience theory’s main categories of contextual factors
(relational, organizational) to drive second-round coding (Layder,
1998; Saldaña, 2013).
Next, the rst and second authors coded a selection of interviews
separately and then met to create consensus and rene the code deni-
tions; this process was then repeated twice. By the end, they required
little dialogue to reach consensus, and both had coded all 20 interviews.
Findings
Factors contributing to resilience are broken down into two broad cat-
egories, relational support and organizational resources, below.
Relational—Families of Origin
All respondents were in touch with at least one biological family mem-
ber, and the majority (n = 14) were in contact with at least one biological
parent. Perhaps surprisingly, since the youth were removed from their
parents’ care due to abuse and/or neglect, about a third of respondents
described parental relationships as helpful. Several made comments like
Frank, who said that his mother had been the “most supportive and
Hokanson et al. Child Welfare
239
helpful” relationship in his life. “My mom always wants what’s best for
me. She knows what’s best for me.”
Other biological family members, especially aunts and uncles, also
provided emotional and social support. Several mentioned advice being
particularly helpful. Danny, 19, said:
ey been helping me keeping myself stable, like keeping me
alert, like knowing what’s right and wrong … [they] just keep me
grounded. Like, sometimes I get over-emotional and ridiculous and
they help me with that … ey just talk to me and stu. Tell me that
I am being ridiculous.
Reggie, 19, said he talks to family members “constantly.” He said,
“my aunt … is like my diary … I talk to my aunt and tell her my life
story every day. Everything that’s happened to me. She’s like my mother
pretty much.” Soa, removed from her parents’ care at 12, said “I know
that my aunt is proud of me,” and that motivated her to keep striving
in school when she felt like giving up. Several expressed that they felt
unconditional love from their families.
Relational—Non-Family
Respondents identied other adults in a variety of roles as having been
helpful to them during their transition from foster care into adulthood,
including ctive kin, chosen family, mentors, teachers, therapists, social
workers, and foster parents. ese adults often lled in gaps in sup-
port from their family of origin. Soa, 20, described a former director
of a youth leadership program as “like my second mom, kind of.” She
also mentioned two mentors in her eld who encouraged her to pursue
her career and provided her with an internship. Irina, 18 and living
independently, had a mentor who “helps me on a daily, I see him every
single day. When I’m hungry and I don’t have anything, he makes sure
he comes and he feeds me. Helps me look for jobs, um, if I need some-
body to talk to when I’m having a bad day, he’s always there.” Lydia, 20,
described her adoptive parents as providing unconditional love, saying,
Child Welfare Vol. 97, No. 6
240
“they have been there for me, like, well, everything. ey never give up
on me.” And Patrice, who was removed from her parents’ care in her
teens, said of her current adult supports, “Each one of the individuals
have one or two characteristics of what a parent would do and they
kinda just ll the emptiness.”
About half of the participants described close relationships with
foster parents that involved unconditional love, permanence, and (in
some cases) people they could not imagine their lives without. Georgio,
who had been involved with DCF since he was “probably about two
or three,” said, “the only people who have been really supportive are
my foster parents.” Speaking of his foster mother, he said, “not really
because it’s her job … but because she’s come to regard me as her own
son, so she’s been super supportive. She’s always helped me out when-
ever she can.” Many also spoke of foster parents who “pushed” them
to get things done. Nia, a 19 year old in her rst year of college, said,
“If I would never have met her, I probably wouldn’t be where I was
because she’s the one who, like, pushed me, like, the hardest.” Marie said:
With the guidance of [my foster parents], I’ve made it, you know,
changed my life. Um, I wasn’t planning to go to college at all, actu-
ally. Um, but they guided me, they told me I’m going to college
(small laugh) and didn’t really have a choice. So (small laugh) I took
the chance, made it come true, pretty much.
Of all the relationships mentioned, positive ones with social workers
were most abundant. Almost three-quarters of the respondents spoke
highly of their workers’ impact on their lives. More than half listed their
social workers as very important to them (in several cases, someone they
could not imagine life without). Marie, 19, had had the same worker
since she was ten, and said, “if she leaves, I wouldn’t know what to do.”
ese relationships also involved advice, emotional support, and a
feeling of being genuinely cared for, with comments like, “she actu-
ally want[s] the best for me” and “she actually care[s] about, like, my
future.” Patrice, a 20 year old in her rst year of college who spent a
quarter of her life in care, said “there are a lot of good things that come
Hokanson et al. Child Welfare
241
out of [being in care] at the end…like having a support system. Having
emotional help.” Reggie, 19, who never mentioned either parent in his
interview, said his worker helped him navigate other family relation-
ships and “helped me deal with being in foster care. And, then just being
there for me if I needed anything.” Oscar, 20, described his worker as
“laidback” and “not like a hardass DCF worker.” He highlighted that
this worker gave him “responsibility” and “freedom”; “He’s just a really
good guy.” Patrice, 20, said of her worker:
My social worker, she kinda taught me that no matter where I came
from, it matters where I am headed. You know, I don’t know how
to explain it … that I can have dreams and goals, like every other
person on this planet.
Organizational—Facilitating Family Relationships
Supportive relationships are important promoters of resilience during
the transition from childhood to adulthood (Zimmerman et al., 2013).
Maintaining and strengthening these relationships builds contextual
and relational support as they transition out of the system and into
independent adulthood. Respondents were directly asked whether and
how DCF as an agency helped with their supportive relationships.
About half said DCF had been helpful with biological family relation-
ships, and many said that DCF was also useful in creating and main-
taining relationships with other caring adults like mentors and social
workers.
Frank, an 18-year-old high school senior, said that his worker
encouraged him to “work things out” with his mother. He had gone to
foster care when he was 16 or 17 due to their communication issues,
and his worker focused on getting them to “work problems out.” He
had moved back in with his mother by the time of this interview.
Marie, involved with DCF from the age of three, said that her mother
had died. Her worker had been attempting to help her make contact
with her siblings. ough they were still searching for most of them,
she said, “there’s a way I can contact one, thanks to my social worker.”
Child Welfare Vol. 97, No. 6
242
DCF supplemented Marie’s lost family with professional supports that
had come to be so close to her she could not imagine life without them.
She said her closest adult relationships were with her foster parents and
social workers.
Organizational—Instrumental
Marie also mentioned that DCF provided her with organizational
resources and support, saying, “everything I need help with, espe-
cially nancial-wise for school and stu, they do help.” In fact, about
three quarters of the sample said DCF had provided at least adequate
resources and support, and most participants wanted to remain involved
with DCF because of the services it provided. Lydia, 19, said she signed
back up for DCF support “because I didn’t have nobody helping me out
and stu like that, so it was the best for me to stay.” e most prevalent
needed services cited by participants were housing, college tuition, and
direct payments.
Almost all respondents were in housing provided by DCF (e.g., fos-
ter care, college campus, independent living program), and about two
thirds (n = 12) were attending college, which was paid for by DCF.
Lydia, who said she had little family support, said, “having DCF help-
ing me out with school, paying for my school, that’s major because
without that, my, there is no possibility where I would be able to pay for
school. I would have probably had to get loans and stu and [it] would
be dicult for me to pay.”
Discussion
In this manuscript, we aimed to understand what contextual fac-
tors that youth formerly in foster care identify as promoters of
resilience during emerging adulthood. Our ndings align with pre-
vious work that place importance on relational contributors to the
resilience of youth formerly in foster care (Courtney et al., 2014;
Hass, Allen, & Amoah, 2014; Hass & Graydon, 2009; Hines,
Hokanson et al. Child Welfare
243
Merdinger, & Wyatt, 2005; Jones, 2012; Unrau, Font, & Rawls, 2012).
We extend this literature by describing the systemic facets of the resil-
ience process, especially noting the depth and importance of respon-
dents’ relationships with their DCF workers.
All 20 of these young adults had at least one caring adult in their
lives, including those within and outside their families of origin. Results
in this study supported earlier research that found great benets from
the presence of at least one supportive adult (Avery, 2010; Greeson &
ompson, 2015; Osterling & Hines, 2006). Our research supports the
robust body of literature that prosocial adult relationships are among
the most important factors in the resilience process, especially for
youth formerly in foster care whose family relationships have been dis-
rupted (Greeson, Usher, & Grinstein-Weiss, 2010; Strolin-Goltzman,
Woodhouse, Suter, & Werrbach, 2016).
In the current study, most respondents intend to maintain relation-
ships with their families of origin. is nding is consistent with the
literature, which relates that it is not uncommon for emancipated youth
to reconnect (and sometimes live) with families of origin (Courtney &
Dworsky, 2006; Cunningham & Diversi, 2013). is, combined with
the importance of relationships in the resilience process, suggests that
child welfare systems should pay close attention to these relationships
while the youth is in care. ese relationships were arguably unhealthy
at the time of removal, so much so that it necessitated removal of the
child for the duration of childhood. Without intervention, it is unlikely
that these relationships will be signicantly healthier when the youth
turns 18 and chooses to reconnect. As such, it is incumbent upon the
child welfare system to nd better ways to support these disrupted
relationships so that youth are better able to navigate them once they
are adults.
Perhaps the most notable nding in this work was the way these
young adults spoke of their foster parents and social workers. Few studies
directly speak to youths’ perceptions of their workers (Augsberger &
Swenson, 2015; De Boer & Coady, 2007; Lane, 2016). Our ndings
echo existing studies: caring workers can make a great dierence in
Child Welfare Vol. 97, No. 6
244
the lives of youth formerly in foster care who are emerging into adult-
hood. In this study, almost three quarters of respondents said their
social workers were very important, supportive, and helpful in their
lives. ese were the relationships most often cited as sources of sup-
port. Respondents expressed feeling genuinely cared for by their social
workers, who provided not only emotional support but also resources
like therapists, services, and advice. Foster parents, too, provided uncon-
ditional love, advice, and encouragement.
Despite the fact that many of these young adults said they could not
imagine life without their workers, many states and agencies discour-
age or forbid child welfare professionals from maintaining relationships
with youth they serve after the termination of their formal relationship.
is paper is in line with a growing body of work suggesting that main-
taining those relationships is advantageous to youth formerly in foster
care (O’Leary, Tsui, & Ruch, 2012). For some respondents, their worker
had been the only stable adult in their childhood. Given the kind of
connection that is sometimes established in the worker-client relation-
ships, reevaluation of these policies may be warranted.
For now, it is generally understood that these relationships are not
meant to be permanent. However, while workers can and should be solid
supports for a “season” (Samuels, 2008), it is perhaps more vital for the
system to nurture youths’ broader network. Youth with strong relational
networks tend to have more resilience (Burt & Paysnick, 2012). Indeed,
reestablishing and maintaining relationships with support networks “is
the strongest and most positive youth development program the child
welfare system can oer, and it is imperative that child welfare profes-
sionals identify ‘promising practice’ service models that are eective at
achieving this outcome” (Avery, 2010, p. 400). is study provides some
examples: youth describe workers who helped them nd their families
and supported them in navigating these relationships.
Organizational support is generally reserved for those most likely
to do well. Respondents understood themselves to be supported by
DCF only if they were employed or in school, while those who need
it most—who cannot maintain employment or are not interested in
Hokanson et al. Child Welfare
245
pursuing college—are left without structural supports on their 18th
birthdays. is counterintuitive setup is worth reconsideration.
Limitations
We examine emerging adults who were already showing resilience; we
did not involve those who were not showing resilience. Having a control
group of respondents who were navigating emerging adulthood with-
out formal supports might have resulted in dierent ndings. Similarly,
resilient young adults no longer involved with DCF were not engaged
in this study. Our sample also had higher than typical educational levels
for youth formerly in foster care. is may be because half were in a
college-support program, but those in the community-based program
also had higher levels of educational attainment than most youth for-
merly in foster care. Using educational attainment as an indicator of
resiliency in this group may have been somewhat problematic; perhaps
resilient youth formerly in foster care who are not involved in these
formal supports also have higher than average educational attainment
due to individual characteristics and not as a result of organizational
support at all.
We cannot account for all the factors associated with risk and resil-
ience, such as types and duration of abuse and/or neglect. While the
work looks at sources of resilience, causes of resilience are beyond its
scope; instead, we aimed to qualitatively examine the experiences of a
group of resilient young people to provide insight into the sources of
their resilience.
Conclusion
Based on what these young people have told us, youth formerly in fos-
ter care can have many, often under-recognized promoters of resilience
in their lives. As they named families of origin as important contribu-
tors to their resilience, agencies and workers would do well to con-
tinue facilitating these relationships, as they are likely to happen with
Child Welfare Vol. 97, No. 6
246
or without agency support. Many also elaborated on the helpfulness of
their foster parents and social workers, who provided both instrumental
and emotional support. Reconsideration of ocial boundaries around
this relationship, though challenging, is warranted.
Youth generally report that DCF ser ves them well. Areas for improve-
ment include providing support without work or school requirements
and aording increased opportunities for independence during their
late teens. Areas of success include providing housing, tuition, nancial,
and emotional support.
e child welfare system holds a sacred duty of raising children into
adulthood when they are removed from their families. While these
youth often carry trauma and complex histories, their futures can, and
should, be bright. ough individual traits like personalities and out-
looks can be nurtured to a certain extent to tip youth towards resilience,
we know from the literature and from these youths’ stories that the
system itself can also set them up for success. e child welfare system,
though awed, is doing many things right; continuing to build on these
is an essential part of its work.
References
Arnett, J. J. (2004). Emerging adulthood: e winding road from the late teens through the
twenties. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Augsberger, A., & Swenson, E. (2015). “My worker was there when it really mattered:”
Foster care youths’ perceptions and experiences of their relationships with child welfare
workers. Families in Society: e Journal of Contemporary Social Services, 96(4), 234–240.
Avery, R. J. (2010). An examination of theory and promising practice for achieving perma-
nency for teens before they age out of foster care. Children and Youth Services Review,
32(3), 399–408.
Batsche, C., Hart, S., Ort, R., Armstrong, M., Strozier, A., & Hummer, V. (2014). Post-
secondary transitions of youth emancipated from foster care. Child & Family Social
Work, 19(2), 174–184.
Benard, B. (2004). Resiliency: What we have learned. San Francisco: WestEd.
Hokanson et al. Child Welfare
247
Bertsch, K., Bremer-Landau, J., Inman, A., DeBoer Kreider, E., Price, T., & DeCarlo, A.
(2014). Evaluation of the critical events in supervision model using gender related
events. Training and Education in Professional Psychology, 8(3), 174.
Berzin, S. C., Rhodes, A. M., & Curtis, M. A. (2011). Housing experiences of former foster
youth: How do they fare in comparison to other youth? Children and Youth Services
Review, 33(11), 2119–2126.
Berzin, S. C., Singer, E., & Hokanson, K. (2014). Emerging versus emancipating: e
transition to adulthood for youth in foster care. Journal of Adolescent Research, 29(5),
616–638.
Burt, K. B., & Paysnick, A. A. (2012). Resilience in the transition to adulthood. Develop-
ment and Psychopathology, 24(2), 493–505.
Child Trends. (2017, November). Supporting young people transitioning from foster care:
Findings from a national survey. Retrieved from www.childtrends.org/publications/
supporting-young-people-transitioning-foster-care-ndings-national-survey
Child Trends. (2019, June). Supporting older youth beyond age 18: Examining data and trends
in extended foster care. Retrieved from www.childtrends.org/publications/supporting-
older-youth-beyond-age-18-examining-data-and-trends-in-extended-foster-care
Child Welfare Information Gateway. (2017). Foster care statistics 2017. Retrieved from
www.childwelfare.gov/pubPDFs/foster.pdf#page=6&view=Outcomes
Courtney, M. E., & Dworsky, A. (2006). Early outcomes for young adults transitioning
from out‐of‐home care in the USA.Child & Family Social Work,11(3), 209–219.
Courtney, M. E., Dworsky, A., Lee, J., & Raap, M. (2010). Midwest evaluation of the adult
functioning of former foster youth: Outcomes at age 23 and 24. Chicago: Chapin Hall at
the University of Chicago.
Courtney, M. E., Charles, P., Okpych, N. J., Halsted, K., Courtney, M. E., & Charles, P.
(2014). California Youth Transitions to Adulthood Study (CalYOUTH): Early nd-
ings from the child welfare worker survey. Retrieved on October 9, 2019.
Cunningham, M. J., & Diversi, M. (2013). Aging out: Youths’ perspectives on foster care
and the transition to independence.Qualitative Social Work,12(5), 587–602.
Day, A., Riebschleger, J., Dworsky, A., Damashek, A., & Fogarty, K. (2012). Maximizing
educational opportunities for youth aging out of foster care by engaging youth voices in
a partnership for social change. Children and Youth Services Review, 34(5), 1007–1014.
De Boer, C., & Coady, N. (2007). Good helping relationships in child welfare: Learning
from stories of success. Child & Family Social Work, 12(1), 32–42.
Child Welfare Vol. 97, No. 6
248
Dworsky, A., & Courtney, M. E. (2010a). Assessing the impact of extending care beyond age 18
on homelessness: Emerging ndings from the Midwest Study. Chicago, IL. Chapin Hall at
the University of Chicago.
Dworsky, A., & Courtney, M. E. (2010b). e risk of teenage pregnancy among transition-
ing foster youth: Implications for extending state care beyond age 18. Children and
Youth Services Review, 32(10), 1351–1356.
Fergus, S., & Zimmerman, M. A. (2005). Adolescent resilience: A framework for under-
standing healthy development in the face of risk. Annual Review of Public Health, 26,
399–419.
Greeson, J. K. P., & ompson, A. E. (2015). Aging out of care in emerging adulthood.
In Arnett, J. J. (Ed.), e Oxford handbook of emerging adulthood (pp. 559–573). Oxford:
Oxford University Press.
Greeson, J. K., Usher, L., & Grinstein-Weiss, M. (2010). One adult who is crazy about
you: Can natural mentoring relationships increase assets among young adults with and
without foster care experience? Children and Youth Services Review, 32(4), 565–577.
Hass, M., & Graydon, K. (2009). Sources of resiliency among successful foster youth.
Children and Youth Services Review, 31(4), 457–463.
Hass, M., Allen, Q., & Amoah, M. (2014). Turning points and resilience of academically
successful foster youth. Children and Youth Services Review, 44, 387–392.
Hill, C. E., Knox, S., ompson, B. J., Williams, E. N., Hess, S. A., & Ladany, N. (2005).
Consensual qualitative research: An update. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 52(2), 196.
Hines, A. M., Merdinger, J., & Wyatt, P. (2005). Former foster youth attending college:
Resilience and the transition to young adulthood. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry,
75(3), 381–394.
Jones, L. (2012). Measuring resiliency and its predictors in recently discharged foster youth.
Child and Adolescent Social Work Journal, 29(6), 515–533.
Lane, T. Y. (2016). Supports for College-Bound African-Americans Formerly in Foster
Care: A Qualitative Study of eir Inuences on Enrollment in College. Journal of
Ethnic & Cultural Diversity in Social Work, 25(2), 153–171.
Layder, D. (1998). Sociological practice: Linking theory and social research. Sa ge.
Masten, A. S. (2018). Resilience theory and research on children and families: Past, present,
and promise. Journal of Family eory & Review, 10(1), 12–31.
National Conference of State Legislatures. (2019, May). Supporting older youth in foster
care. Retrieved from www.ncsl.org/research/human-services/supports-older-youth.aspx
Hokanson et al. Child Welfare
249
O’Leary, P., Tsui, M. S., & Ruch, G. (2012). e boundaries of the social work relation-
ship revisited: Towards a connected, inclusive and dynamic conceptualisation.British
Journal of Social Work,43(1), 135–153.
Oshima, K. M. M., Narendorf, S. C., & McMillen, J. C. (2013). Pregnancy risk among
older youth transitioning out of foster care. Children and Youth Services Review, 35(10),
1760–1765.
Osterling, K. L., & Hines, A. M. (2006). Mentoring adolescent foster youth: Promot-
ing resilience during developmental transitions. Child & Family Social Work, 11(3),
242–253.
Saldaña, J. (2013). e coding manual for qualitative researchers (2nd ed.). Sage. ousand
Oaks, CA.
Samuels, G. M. (2008). A reason, a season, or a lifetime: Relational permanence among young
adults with foster care backgrounds. Chicago, IL: Chapin Hall Center for Children at the
University of Chicago.
Singer, E. R., Berzin, S. C., & Hokanson, K. (2013). Voices of former foster youth: Sup-
portive relationships in the transition to adulthood. Children and Youth Services Review,
35(12), 2110–2117.
Stewart, C. J., Kum, H. C., Barth, R. P., & Duncan, D. F. (2014). Former foster youth:
Employment outcomes up to age 30. Children and Youth Services Review, 36, 220–229.
Strolin-Goltzman, J., Woodhouse, V., Suter, J., & Werrbach, M. (2016). A mixed method
study on educational well-being and resilience among youth in foster care. Children and
Youth Services Review, 70, 30–36.
Unrau, Y., Font, S., & Rawls, G. (2012). Readiness for college engagement among students
who have aged out of foster care. Children and Youth Services Review, 34(1), 76–83.
Yates, T. M., & Grey, I. K. (2012). Adapting to aging out: Proles of risk and resilience
among emancipated foster youth. Development and Psychopathology, 24(2), 475–492.
Zimmerman, M. A. (2013). Resiliency theory: A strengths-based approach to research and
practice for adolescent health. Health Education & Behavior, 40(4), 381–383.
