#32 It Takes A Network, Not A Superhero - with Robbie Gilligan

Send us Fan MailWhat if lasting change for young people in care comes not from a single attachment, but from a web of “many good adults” who open doors to the wider world? We sit down with Emeritus Professor Robbie Gilligan to trace how schools, mentors, hobbies, and work links create belonging that survives the transition out of care. Drawing on four decades of research and vivid stories—from a nun buying Sinead O’Connor’s first guitar to a baker mentoring a teen before dawn—we map an outward-facing practice that turns values into opportunities.Across the conversation, we challenge the narrow gaze that reduces a child’s world to placements and case files. School rises as a daily engine of recognition and routine; groups and residential communities offer regulation and growth; and community networks carry young people beyond age eighteen, when statutory support often fades. Robbie makes the case for social capital alongside attachment theory, showing how curated networks of teachers, coaches, employers, extended family, and former carers reduce reliance on luck and buffer life’s inevitable ruptures.We also unpack what meaningful participation really looks like: keeping young people in the loop, protecting their face among peers, and showing visible influence from what they say. Certainty lowers anxiety; small, consistent actions build trust. The takeaway is practical and hopeful—scaffold repair, protect talents and interests through moves, and design services that help each child enter the world with more connections than they had yesterday. If you care about child protection, residential care, foster care, or the journey of care leavers, this is a grounded, humane roadmap for change.Robbie’s Bio:Robbie holds a Professor Emeritus appointment at the School of Social Work and Social Policy, Trinity College Dublin. He previously served as Professor of Social Work and Social Policy at Trinity from 2001- 2022, and in total was a full time academic there for 40 years. He has worked in the area of children in care, care leavers and marginalised young people in many roles over his career including as: youth worker, social worker, policy advocate, foster carer, board member of residential and community services, adviser, social work educator and researcher. He has published widely in relation to the experiences of children and young people in out of home care and care experienced adults (with a strong focus on their work and education journeys). He has recently published with Vietnamese colleagues a study of care leaver experiences in Vietnam. He is currently Co-Principal Investigator of Ten Years On - a national study of care leavers in their late twenties/early thirties in Ireland.  He has also served as an adviser (2021-22) to the Organisation for Economic Coooperation and Development report on care-leavers - the first such intervention by OECD on this topic: Improving care leavers’ socioeconomic outcomes | The OECD Forum Network (oecd-forum.org). See https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4150-3523 for a full list of his publications and outputsLinks:Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/TheSecureStartPodcastPodcast Blog Site: https://thesecurestartpodcast.com/Secure Start Site: https://securestart.com.au/DisclaimerInformation reported by guests of this podcast is assumed to be accurate as stated. Podcast owner Colby Pearce is not responsible for any error of facts presented by podcast guests. In addition, unless otherwise specified, opinions expressed by guests of this podcast may not reflect those of the podcast owner, Colby Pearce.Support the show