Does the provincial government know where its children are?

Years after promising better data collection, New Brunswick isn't keeping track of basic information about how youth are progressing under government care. 

The Department of Social Development says it isn't tracking how many youth in care finish high school or how many former youth in care are attending post-secondary schools. 

The department also isn't keeping track of how many are convicted of crimes, incarcerated, struggling with addiction, unhoused or unemployed — or how many have grown into healthy, thriving adults.

That's despite calls from the province's child and youth advocate Kelly Lamrock and legislative changes introduced in 2022 to mandate tracking outcomes. 

Lamrock said the department is holding itself to a lower standard than parents.

"If a parent didn't know if their kid graduated or was in jail, Social Development would knock on their door and ask to interview them," he said during committee hearings at the time. "But Social Development doesn't know."

In response to Lamrock's concerns about tracking how youth in care fare, then-social development minister Bruce Fitch proposed that a register kept by the department also track "outcomes obtained" — an amendment to the bill that ultimately passed into law.

The legislation came into force in January 2024, but the information it addresses still isn't being tracked. 

Cindy Miles, the current social development minister, says the department is still following child welfare law.

"I don't see us in a contravention of the act," she said in an interview. "I see us in the implementation process of that right now."

"I'm looking forward to those data points coming together as soon as possible."

In an email, the department said it expects graduation data will be collected and made public by late spring. 

Child welfare law says the province may support former youth in care who are accepted to post-secondary school — but Social Development doesn't know how many have accessed that support, or how many complete a post-secondary degree.

Miles also said she is working to gather data on employment, crime, housing and income support.

'Abdication of responsibility'

As of the province's last update in December 2024, there were 735 children and youth in permanent care of the minister, and 489 in temporary legal care.

Social Development's register is now used to keep "accurate and up-to-date case notes" on any child receiving social services, said spokesperson Judy Winter.

"These outcomes are related to the disposition of the child (i.e. taken into care, returned home with supports, living with kin, adopted, and more)," Winter said by email.

Without better tracking, Lamrock said, the province can't know whether its services to children and youth are working. 

Lamrock believes if the department intended to follow the recommendation he made in 2022, it would have done so by now. 

"The fact government doesn't know about its own kids is an abdication of responsibility," he said in an interview. 

"I think for a government to be the parent to 1,000 kids and say, 'I don't know if they're going to high school or in jail,' at some point, that's either acceptable or it isn't. I think it's unacceptable."

'Who's accountable?'

John Sharpe, executive director at Partners for Youth, noted that New Brunswick's child welfare laws are clear that children in care have a right to education — and questions whether the act is being respected.

"When we talk about accountability, the system has to be accountable to kids," he said.

"We've had decades of kids not graduating high school, right? So who's accountable to that? Is it the child's fault that they're not given the resources necessary to graduate from high school?"

Jacqueline Gahagan, Mount Saint Vincent University associate vice-president research, is studying educational attainment for those formerly in government care. 

Gahagan says data on graduation rates in Canada is a patchwork. While more research is needed, they say the available data for children in care suggests a much lower graduation rate compared to other children.

"That has lifelong consequences economically, socially, politically, and in terms of worse health outcomes," they said.

Sharpe said children and youth in care face certain conditions that can make education more difficult, such as changing placement locations. 

"We're aware of some kids that grew up in the care system that, by the time they've gone through kindergarten, oftentimes not completing high school but into high school, some we know of have been through 17 to 20 different schools in their career," Sharpe said.

"In less than 10 years … how can you get any stability? How can you gain traction?"

The advocate has also previously reported children in government care are 20 times more likely to be put on a partial day plan — where a student has reduced class time, and no alternate educational resources provided.

As provinces receive funding from Ottawa for improving education, they should be required to collect data on those who graduate and those who do not, Gahagan said.. 

"I think having an aggregate … overview of what's working where and why, that would actually be very helpful for policy folks and for programming folks to, to decide this is a good use of our finite tax dollars to actually scale up some of these successful interventions."

Ultimately, Lamrock said data can inform better interventions in childhood, in turn preventing greater costs to the province down the road. 

"Broken adults are a lot more expensive to fix than kids with some needs," Lamrock said.

"If we don't like homelessness, unemployment, crime, if we don't like paying for policing, if we don't like paying for social assistance, if we don't like paying for bad health outcomes, then the time to intervene is when people are younger."