LAS LICENCIAS

A systematic literature search was conducted between 19 and 23 August 2019 and updated on 29 June 2020, using the search engine EBSCO Host to identify the literature in the research area. The following databases were searched:

 _{Academic Search Complete}  British Education Index

 _{Child Development and Adolescent Studies}  CINAHL

 Education Research Complete

 _{Education Resource Information Centre}  PsychINFO

 Teacher Reference Centre

Table 2.1 summarises the inclusion and exclusion criteria applied to all research with further detail provided in Appendix 1.

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Table 2.1

Inclusion and Exclusion Criteria for Literature Search 1

Included Excluded

Publication Details Scholarly peer-

reviewed journals, non- peer reviewed articles, unpublished doctoral theses, charity- conducted research

Clinical opinion and reflective articles, non- fiction sources, websites, policy documents, meta- analyses or literature reviews

Language English Non-English

Participants  _{CYP finding}

permanence through an adoption order, special guardianship order or child arrangements order (formerly residence order)

 _{Parents who had}

adopted a child

 _{CYP living with their}

birth families

 _{Parents caring for}

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under one of three permanency arrangements

 CYP in foster care or residential care  Foster carers  Professionals supporting looked- after or permanently placed CYP Participants’ Country of Residence  _{CYP adopted}

through the UK care system

 Parents who had adopted a child through the UK care system

 CYP being looked- after through the UK care system

 _{Foster carers caring}

for a child

considered looked- after by the UK care

 _{CYP adopted}

internationally or from international institutions

 CYP under the care of an

international care system

 _{Parents who had}

adopted or fostered a child internationally

 Professionals supporting

20 system  Professionals supporting CYP considered looked- after by or adopted through the UK care system internationally adopted or looked-after CYP Children’s Education Status

CYP educated in the UK

CYP educated outside the UK

Participants’ Age  Secondary aged CYP 11-16 years

 Adoptive parents, foster carers or professionals of any age

CYP aged 16+ who had left compulsory

education

Each database was searched independently using the subject index function to identify any synonyms and/or related terms for the key search terms, for

example, adopted children, adoption (child), adoptees; looked-after children, foster children. Boolean logic was used to incorporate identified synonyms and related terms in order to avoid excluding articles which used different

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 (Adopt* (expanded using each database’s subject index function) OR Foster children* (expanded using each database’s subject index function) )

 _{AND (“transition*” or “transfer*”)}  AND (“education*” or “school*”)

Titles and abstracts were screened to determine relevance to the topic. Articles which appeared to meet the inclusion criteria where then subject to a full

content screen, resulting in no articles meeting the criteria detailed above.

Owing to the paucity of research literature found using subject index searching techniques, keyword searching of Title, Subject Terms, Keywords and Abstracts search fields was undertaken on each data base independently using the

following search terms:

 (“adopt* child*” OR “children adopted from care” OR “adoptees” OR “permanently placed child*” OR “previously in care” OR “previously looked after” OR “special guardianship*” OR “child arrangement order” OR “residence order” OR "look* after child*" OR "child* in care" OR "child* looked after" OR "CIC" OR "LAC" OR "child* in residential care" OR "out of home care" OR “adopt* parent”)

 _{AND (“transition” OR “transfer”)}

Titles and abstracts were screened to determine relevance to the topic and ascertain whether they met the inclusion criteria. This screening process left two articles which were subjected to a full content screen. Both were deemed to

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meet the criteria for inclusion in the current review (Brewin & Statham, 2011; Drew & Banerjee, 2019).

Both hand searching of the journal ‘Adoption & Fostering’ and citation searching using the SCOPUS database yielded no additional results.

A grey search using Google Scholar was undertaken using the phrases

“adopted children and transition to secondary school”, “looked-after children and transition to secondary school” and “children in care and transition to secondary school”. This search yielded one article relating to practitioner-led research carried out by King (2009) and two Government research reports conducted by Selwyn et al. (2014) and Selwyn and Meakings (n.d.). All three publications were related to secondary transition for adopted young people. A systematic search was also conducted using the British Library’s EThOS system in order to explore unpublished doctoral theses on secondary transition for adopted and looked-after children. The same phrases used in the Google Scholar search were used to conduct this search. Tittles and abstracts were screened to determine relevance to the topic and ascertain whether they met the inclusion criteria. One unpublished thesis (Gosling, 2012) was excluded due to

accessibility issues as a result of the 2020 Public Health Crisis. The thesis on which the article by Brewin and Statham (2011) was based was also found (Walker, 2009); however, it was not reviewed further. Websites by UK-based charities supporting adopted and looked-after children were searched

individually for any research relating to secondary transition. No additional publications were found.

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Finally, reference lists of the five included publications were hand searched for any further articles meeting the inclusion criteria. No additional articles were found. Appendix 2 provides details of the final five publications included in the review.