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Education Secured? The School Performance of Adolescents in Secure Residential Youth Care

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Abstract

Background

Despite poor school performance by adolescents in secure residential care and the potential importance of education during care, little is known about how to achieve academic success with these adolescents.

Objective

Therefore, the aim of the present study is to assess adolescents’ academic achievement during secure residential care and to identify factors that are associated with adolescents’ achievement.

Methods

In the present study, we have included a sample of 53 adolescents in secure residential care using information from the individual care plans, the adolescents themselves, and their teachers.

Results

Contrary to our expectations, teachers report an average-to-good school performance for a majority of the adolescents (53.8 %). Partly consistent with our expectations, students with an average intelligence level, good academic motivation, and/or relatively few externalizing behavioral problems show significantly better academic achievement than students with a low intelligence level, poor academic motivation, and/or many externalizing problems. The results also suggest that low intelligence and poor motivation predict academic achievement, both directly and indirectly, through an increased risk for externalizing problems. Unexpectedly, we did not find significant associations between teachers’ interaction skills, student–teacher relationship quality, and adolescents’ academic achievement.

Conclusions

Considering our findings, future research should aim at interventions that focus on improving teachers’ ability to handle poor academic motivation and externalizing behavioral problems.

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Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Special Needs Education and Youth Care, Faculty of Behavioral and Social Sciences, University of Groningen, Groote Rozenstraat 38, 9712 TJ, Groningen, The Netherlands

    Annemiek T. Harder, Anne-Marie N. Huyghen, Jana Knot-Dickscheit, Margrite E. Kalverboer & Erik J. Knorth

  2. University of Hildesheim, Hildesheim, Germany

    Stefan Köngeter & Maren Zeller

Authors
  1. Annemiek T. Harder
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  2. Anne-Marie N. Huyghen
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  3. Jana Knot-Dickscheit
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  4. Margrite E. Kalverboer
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  5. Stefan Köngeter
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  6. Maren Zeller
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  7. Erik J. Knorth
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Correspondence to Annemiek T. Harder.

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Harder, A.T., Huyghen, AM.N., Knot-Dickscheit, J. et al. Education Secured? The School Performance of Adolescents in Secure Residential Youth Care. Child Youth Care Forum 43, 251–268 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10566-013-9232-z

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