The Role of Social Support in Promoting Access to College for Older Youth in Foster Care

Background: Youth in foster care are less likely than their peers to enter and complete college. However, certain types of social capital and social support may promote college access. Our hypothesis is that a combination of bridging ties and credible encouragement increases the likelihood that foster youth enter college. Drawing on social capital theory, bridging ties link individuals to information, resources, and opportunities seldom present in close, intimate ties. Since foster youth come from families and neighborhood where college completion is not common, having supportive adults who have gone through college, can offer substantive guidance, and are able to link youth with education resources may help youth navigate the unfamiliar and daunting college entrance process. However, we argue that encouragement to pursue college from people with educational credibility is also important. Drawing on social psychology concepts, we theorize that credible encouragement plays a role in identity formation and motivating youth to pursue college as a real possibility.

Methods: Data is drawn from the CalYOUTH study, a representative sample of older adolescents in California foster care (n=727, response rate=95%). Baseline data were collected in 2013 when youth were 17 years old, and cases were linked to National Student Clearinghouse college enrollment records in March 2015, when youth were 19/20. Bridging ties is measured as the number of the following individuals who can provide education guidance and resources that youth nominated during a social support name generator task: teacher, school counselor, mentor, caseworker, therapist, foster parent, or other professional. Credible encouragement is dummy coded, indicating whether or not youth reported receiving “a lot” of encouragement to pursue college from school staff. To test our hypothesis, we interacted bridging ties and credible encouragement. Logistic regression models tested whether social capital/support predicted later college enrollment. We started with an empty model and sequentially added groups of covariates in the following categories: personality traits, demographic characteristics, foster care and maltreatment history, behavioral health and substance use problems, academic performance, and education history (e.g., grade repetition, expulsion, special education). Multiple imputation was used to handle missing data and survey weights expanded findings to the CA population of foster youth.

Results: In the full model without the interaction term, neither credible encouragement (OR=1.08, p=.715) nor bridging ties (OR=1.20, p=.067) predicted enrollment. However, the interaction of the two predicted an increased likelihood of enrollment (OR=1.67; p=.019). When stratified by reading level in supplemental analyses, the interaction of encouragement and bridges significantly increased the odds of enrollment for youth reading at 11^th grade or higher (OR=3.59, p=.012) but not youth reading at 10^th grade or lower (OR=1.55, p=.101).

Conclusions and Implications: Credible encouragement and bridging ties increased the likelihood that foster youth enrolled in college, controlling for grades, school history, and several other factors. However, results suggest that if students are behind academically (as measured by reading level), this support may be less relevant. Future research needs to replicate findings and test potential mechanisms, but these findings point to potential levers that could help foster youth enter college.