Mixed perceptions of self-determination: Struggles facing youth with disabilities transitioning from foster care

Youth with disabilities living in foster care are vulnerable to negative outcomes in their transition to adulthood. Foster parents can be an important transition resource, but the transition process and the different mandates of foster care and adult disability services can complicate foster parents’ potential role. The purpose of this paper is to illuminate nuances and tensions that can arise between disability service workers and foster care providing parents in implementing self-determination-based, person centered services for youth with disabilities transitioning from foster care. We achieve this through an in-depth examination of the approaches to self-determination taken by a foster father and the disability services workers involved with one youth’s transition to adulthood. We use an instrumental case study to provide a detailed contextual analysis of a bounded case and we define our case as the perspectives of a longstanding foster father – Walter - and his experiences of the transition to adulthood for one youth – Seth – who had multiple disability diagnoses. Seth’s transition is presented primarily from the perspective of his foster father, Walter who took part in a series of five interview-observations and interviews. Walter’s perspectives are elaborated by a brief perspective provided by Seth during the first interview-observation and by 60 pages of documentation from Seth’s disability services agency to and about Walter. We followed Seth’s transition beginning when Seth was 19 and concluding shortly after Seth’s death from a drug overdose at age 24. We underline challenges and the tensions that arise when disability workers and foster parents appear to hold differing approaches to self-determination. We suggest how adult service systems and policy makers might better support youth with disabilities in transitioning from foster care through more tailored understandings and approaches to working together to support both youth and the foster care providing parents.