Educational Outcomes of Youth Involved in Child Protective Services: A Meta-Analytic Review

According to recent literature reviews, youth in child protective services (CPS-youth) are at risk for poor educational attainment. Yet the percentages of CPS-youth completing secondary school and enrolling in a postsecondary school vary significantly between studies. Twenty studies were reviewed and meta-analyses conducted to determine these percentages averaged across the population of studies on CPS-youth and education, and also to determine moderator-effects explaining variability in the percentages. Across studies 72.8% of CPS-youth completed secondary school and 34.3% enrolled in a postsecondary school. Gender had the largest effect on educational attainment, with samples composed more of females having higher percentages of postsecondary enrolment. Meanwhile, samples of older participants had higher percentages of secondary school diplomas. Ethnicity had a small effect on educational attainment with samples composed less of Black-CPS youth having higher educational attainment percentages. Discussion centres on this pattern of findings and their implications and applications for research and policy.