Scaffolding of Success: Support, Educational Equity and the Lifelong Reality of Care Experience

Abstract

Transitions from care into adulthood are often a shift from dependence to independence. Yet for care-experienced individuals, this process is neither linear nor complete at a predetermined age. Despite progressive Scottish policies—such as The Promise—many still face unequal access to support. This article explores how structural and relational scaffolding can transform outcomes. Drawing on the lived and professional knowledge of three care-experienced authors, it examines how language, relationship-based practice, and support influence definitions of success. Reframing care experience as lifelong challenges systems to provide enduring, person-centered support. While research affirms the importance of responsive scaffolding, few studies center the voices of care-experienced adults in defining what effective support looks like. This article addresses that gap by placing care-experienced authors not as subjects, but as analysts and advocates. The article is based on a collaborative, care-informed reflective process. The authors adapted the Gibbs Reflective Cycle to suit a trauma-aware and relational approach. Their reflections are not anecdotal—they are critically analyzed, thematically structured, and used as evidence to interrogate systems and propose alternatives. Key findings highlight the importance of sustained relational practice, responsive educational support, and recognizing care experience as lifelong.

1. Introduction

Scotland’s evolving policy landscape reflects a growing commitment to improving outcomes for care-experienced individuals. The term care experience itself is a more inclusive evolution to previously used terms such as Looked After Child or Care Leaver. In Scotland, its use gained momentum alongside the 2017 Independent Care Review, which aimed to improve Scotland’s care system holistically (Independent Care Review, 2017). Frameworks such as Getting It Right for Every Child (Scottish Government, 2023) and The Promise (Independent Care Review, 2020) signal a shift beyond procedural compliance toward rights-based, trauma-informed, and relational models of care.

These developments mirror wider international efforts to reframe how the needs of care-experienced people are understood and supported. Countries such as Australia, New Zealand, and Sweden have begun to explore lifelong, relational approaches to care transitions (Mendes & Snow, 2016; Atwool, 2020; Höjer & Sjöblom, 2014), reflecting a global concern with the gap between progressive policy intentions and the lived realities of those who have experienced care. Yet a persistent gap remains between these ambitions and the lived realities of many care-experienced people (WhoCares? Scotland, 2024). While this article is grounded in the authors’ experiences within Scotland, its analysis and recommendations speak to themes that are globally relevant to care-experienced people, and those supporting them.

Scotland’s Children’s Hearings System (CHS) is a distinctive, welfare-based legal framework through which decisions about children’s care and support needs are made by trained lay tribunal members. As the primary route into formal care, the CHS reflects a holistic, rights-focused approach (Children’s Hearings Scotland, 2024). The number of children in care in Scotland has fluctuated over the past two decades. In 2005, there were 12,185 (Scottish Government, 2011), by 2010 this had increased to 15,892, then declining to 14,458 in 2020 (Scottish Government, 2021). The latest figures from 2024 show 11,844 children in care in Scotland (Scottish Government, 2025a). The rate of children looked after per 1000 children was 11.7 in 2024, the lowest rate since 2005. In 2024, the most common placements away from home were kinship care: 35%, foster care: 32%, and residential accommodation:11% (Scottish Government, 2025a).

International research has increasingly recognized the importance of sustained, relationship-based scaffolding in supporting care-experienced people. Pinkerton and van Breda (2019) frame policy as a form of social ecological scaffolding that can buffer against adversity during transitions from care. Stein (2012) highlights the protective role of supportive adults in shaping outcomes. Scaffolding refers to the structures—both relational and systemic—that support individuals to grow, transition, and thrive. Effective scaffolding ensures individuals are not left to navigate complexity alone; it provides both stability and momentum, making possible what otherwise might be out of reach.

This article examines the concept of scaffolding around care—understood as the structural, relational, emotional, and practical frameworks that enable care-experienced individuals to pursue meaningful, self-determined lives (Pinkerton & van Breda, 2019). It explores how such scaffolding is realized, disrupted, or withheld across domains including education, mental health, language, and identity. It proposes that relationship-based practice, when enacted with authenticity, functions as both anchor and launchpad, offering the stability from which young people can develop aspirations and take risks. It is not transactional—it is built on trust, consistency, and connection.

In envisioning a future where care experience is not a barrier to opportunity, these authors do more than call for reform. They show what it means to thrive with scaffolding: to be held, believed in, and equipped to build a life on one’s own terms. The Promise emerged from the Independent Care Review—a commitment to all care-experienced children and young people that they will grow up loved, safe, and respected (The Promise Scotland, 2020). While this is implemented these voices offer both a roadmap, and a form of accountability. If scaffolding is truly effective, care-experienced people will not need to be exceptional to succeed—they will simply have what everyone deserves: the support to reach their potential, wherever their journey began. This article aims to examine how care-experienced individuals understand and experience success, and how that success is shaped by the presence or absence of good scaffolding.

2. Literature Review

Research on transitions from care has consistently highlighted structural challenges young people face as they navigate life beyond statutory support. Stein (2012) identified distinct trajectories among care leavers—those who move on, survive, or struggle—demonstrating the critical influence of relational and structural support during this period. Mendes and Snow (2016) further argue that outcomes are closely tied to the presence of sustained, rights-based scaffolding, rather than to individual resilience alone.

The concept of scaffolding has gained prominence as a way to understand how systems can better support care-experienced people. Pinkerton and van Breda (2019) conceptualize policy itself as a form of social ecological scaffolding—enabling or constraining young people’s ability to thrive. van Breda (2018) challenges deficit-based models by positioning resilience not as a personal trait, but as an outcome of well-scaffolded environments. While this growing body of literature emphasizes the importance of relational practice there remains a gap in research that centers the voices of care-experienced adults themselves. This article seeks to address that gap by co-producing knowledge from within lived experience.

Within Scotland, The Promise (Independent Care Review, 2020) represents a significant contemporary policy commitment to transforming care. Emerging from an extensive care-experienced-led review process, The Promise articulates a vision in which all children and young people grow up “loved, safe, and respected,” underpinned by structural change across five foundations: Voice, Family, Care, People, and Scaffolding. Its framing explicitly challenges short-term, age-bound models of support and calls for lifelong, relationship-based scaffolding. While this vision aligns with international research (Atwool, 2020; Höjer & Sjöblom, 2014), questions remain about the extent to which it will translate into consistent, lived-reality for care-experienced people over time.

3. Research Method

The decision to include only three co-authors as contributors was intentional. We do not aim to represent all care-experienced voices. Instead, our aim is to offer depth and create space for care-experienced authorship in academic discourse. All authors are consultants affiliated with CELCIS—a leading improvement, innovation and research center based at University of Strathclyde, Scotland.

Our work is grounded in a dual positionality: individuals who have personally navigated care systems and professionals engaged in research, advocacy, and reform. We also acknowledge our shared positionality as women now some years beyond our time in care, writing from places of relative stability, success, and agency. These conditions enable our contribution while inevitably influencing it. Our reflections are rooted in lived reality but mediated by time, resilience, and access to opportunities not available to all. This awareness situates our insights within a broader spectrum of care-experienced realities. Rather than adopting a traditional empirical methodology, this article follows a dialogic and reflexive approach rooted in co-production and relational ethics.

Our reflective process bore resemblance to Gibbs Reflective Cycle (Gibbs, 1988), through open unprompted dialogue we naturally moved through stages akin to description, emotion, evaluation, analysis, conclusion, and action. Though not applied systematically, this loose alignment helped support depth, emotional safety, and critical insight throughout our discussions. Our approach aligns with trauma-informed research values that prioritize emotional safety, trust, and lived experience as valid knowledge. This reflects guidance from organizations such as WhoCares? Scotland (2023), which advocates for relational, rights-based research led by those with lived experience.

Our reflections developed over time through a relaxed but intentional series of dialogues. Rather than using interview questions, we allowed space for experiences, insights, and memories to surface naturally. As recurring themes began to emerge—such as education, identity, mental health, and relational support—we collaboratively explored them and shaped the narrative structure of this article around them. By not following traditional method—this emergent, trust-based approach mirrored the elusive kind of responsive scaffolding we advocate for in this article.

The content draws directly from the authors’ experiences of transitioning from care and working within systems that support (or fail to support) care-experienced people. Each author contributed aspects of their lived reality—from early transitions to education, identity, and mental health—before collaboratively analyzing these through the lens of policy, practice, and literature. This process demanded a high level of emotional labor and vulnerability, and was underpinned by a shared commitment to integrity, reciprocity, and healing. In this way, the act of writing became a method in itself: a space to reframe deficit-based discourses and assert care-experienced knowledge as valid, complex, and powerful.

This methodology reflects a broader epistemological stance: that care-experienced people are not simply subjects of policy but agents of knowledge production. This article aims to disrupt traditional hierarchies of expertise by affirming that lived experience, when critically engaged and contextualized, offers unique and essential insights into how systems function and how they can be transformed. In acknowledging this, the authors consciously resisted the need to anonymize or abstract their stories, instead choosing to present them as integral components of the article’s argument and evidence base.

By centering lived experience within a relational, co-produced framework, this article offers a mode of inquiry that is both critical and care informed. It is not an observational account of others’ transitions, but a textured exploration authored by those who have lived them. The methodology itself becomes a form of scaffolding—one that supports the articulation of knowledge, the creation of trust, solidarity, and collective voice.

4. Perspectives of Success

4.1. Relational Practice as a Foundation for Success

This section introduces a lived account of relational scaffolding, and an exploration of how experiences can align with, or diverge from, existing research. Over the past decade, Scotland has seen a marked shift in its legislative and policy landscape regarding care-experienced young people. Frameworks such as Getting It Right for Every Child (GIRFEC) (Scottish Government, 2023), The Promise (Independent Care Review, 2020), and Staying Put Scotland (Scottish Government, 2013) reflect a bold commitment to embedding holistic, rights-based approaches within throughcare and aftercare provision. These initiatives champion a multi-dimensional vision of support—spanning housing, education, financial security, and mental health. Yet, for all their ambition, a stubborn disjuncture persists between the promise of policy and lived reality. Too many young people continue to navigate transitions from care without the essential scaffolding required for safety, dignity, and aspiration (Independent Care Review, 2020; Coram Voice, 2018).

While frameworks like GIRFEC and The Promise articulate the centrality of relational, integrated care, their realization on the ground remains hampered by systemic constraints. Social workers, overwhelmed by caseloads and bureaucratic demands, are often unable to provide the sustained, relationship-based practice that trauma-informed support necessitates (Munro, 2011). Transformative change will not emerge from minor administrative reform—it demands cultural reorientation in how care is understood, valued, and enacted. Care-experienced young people do not merely need services; they need people—emotionally available, consistently present adults who see them not as problems to manage but as potential to be cultivated.

Success, in this context, is scaffolded: it grows from the everyday acts of atonement, trust, and advocacy that enable a young person not only to survive but to imagine a future on their own terms. Research underscores the vital role of sustained relationships during transitional periods. Stein’s (Stein, 2012) typology of care leavers powerfully illustrates this: those who “move on” typically do so within a web of stable, supportive relationships; “survivors” manage alone, often at a personal cost; while “strugglers” face heightened risks of exclusion and harm. The difference between these trajectories lies not in inherent capability, but in the presence or absence of relational and structural scaffolding. This evidence challenges deficit-based narratives of care experience and calls instead for systemic investment in enduring, person-centered support.

An author shares her own journey through the complexities of leaving care—a narrative that exemplifies both the failures of the system and the profound power of relational practice. Amid structural gaps, it was the presence of key individuals who changed the arc of her story. At school, a handful of teachers recognized her behavior as a response to adversity rather than defiance and responded with empathy rather than sanction. Their efforts became early scaffolds of belief and belonging. A simple phrase—“You only get out what you put in”—offered not just motivation, but a reframing of agency and possibility. Her next pivotal moment came during the transition to university. When she reached out to social work services, hesitant and unsure, a duty worker responded with an offer to meet in person. That meeting evolved into a consistent, trusting relationship through which she accessed the entitlements and security she had previously been unaware of. The scaffolding provided by that relationship—both practical and emotional—was transformative. It enabled her not only to succeed in higher education, but to thrive. While studying for a degree, she worked part-time, gaining financial independence and experience. Within three years, she had saved a deposit and bought her first home. That milestone became profoundly symbolic when she became pregnant: homeownership was no longer just an asset—it was a testament to continuity, safety, and a future she could pass on to her son.

This story, however, is not the norm. The author is acutely aware that her success hinged on contingency—on the right person answering the phone. Such precariousness is unacceptable. A system reliant on chance cannot be called equitable. Too often, young people must endure a crisis before qualifying for support. This reactive model is not only unjust; it actively compounds harm. What is needed is a proactive, relational infrastructure that surrounds care-experienced individuals with the understanding, consistency, and investment they deserve from the outset. Scotland’s frameworks provide a hopeful foundation but hope alone cannot bridge the gap between vision and reality. If care-experienced people are to truly flourish, then our definitions of success must shift—from individualized outcomes to collective, relational scaffolding. Relational practice is not a peripheral concern; it is the linchpin of meaningful care. It is through emotionally intelligent, consistent, and attuned relationships that recovery becomes possible, that resilience can take root, and that aspirations are not just imagined but realized. To honor the intent of Scotland’s policy vision, relational practice must be embedded at every level—from policy design to frontline delivery. The scaffolding of success must be sturdy, sustained, and rooted in an unwavering understanding of the potential of those with care experience. Only then can we transform individual stories of triumph into a collective narrative of success.

4.2. Reframing Language and Lifelong Identity in Care Experience

This section draws on a personal account of care identity and language and connects these to current debates in research and policy. Today, the term care-experience is widely recognized, reflecting a deeper understanding of care as an enduring experience, not limited to childhood or legal status. However, the term has no statutory basis; concerningly, the prevailing legal term remains Looked After Child (Education Services, 2019). Nonetheless, this shift in language is significant and continuing to evolve; from October 2024 to January 2025, the Scottish Government invited input on the development of a universal, inclusive definition of “care-experience”. Submission of responses has concluded; analysis is underway, and findings are expected in the coming months, with a formal summary and potential policy revisions (Scottish Government, 2025b). Earlier terms implied that once care ends, so too does its impact—a notion increasingly challenged by research on the lasting effects of early life experiences (Huang et al., 2023). Recognizing care experience as lifelong is essential. Scotland’s former First Minister Humza Yousaf MSP affirmed this, “There is more we can and should be doing to Keep Our Promise to Scotland’s Care Experienced people, because we know care experience is lifelong.” (WhoCares? Scotland, 2023). The Promise Scotland has emphasized the need for scaffolding that is stable, responsive, and relational, extending beyond statutory definitions. These shifts reflect a deeper re-evaluation of the role the state and society must play—not just during care, but throughout the life course. Reframing care experience as lifelong is not merely semantic; it challenges systems to design for continuity, equity, and dignity.

Language plays a crucial role in this process. It influences how care-experienced people are perceived and treated by institutions. Shifting the narrative away from deficit-based models toward strength-based framing opens space for empowerment. Choice—a central principle of trauma-informed practice—helps foster autonomy and honors diverse pathways to success (SAMHSA, 2014). In this context, language acts as a form of policy. It influences whose stories are heard, whose needs are acknowledged, and whose potential is invested in. Framing—how stories are told and interpreted—shapes public attitudes and institutional behaviors, when people think differently, they act differently (O’Hara, 2025). This shift aligns with structural developments designed to better reflect lived experience.

An author’s transition out of care involved being dropped off at a hotel at the age of sixteen. The only follow-up was a single phone call a week later to check if she was “okay.” With no guidance or any form of support, she focused on surviving—and she did. But it took two decades for her to realize she was not “okay,” and, crucially, that she was not the problem. The problem was the absence of support. Thankfully, society’s collective understanding of care experience has evolved. Today, scaffolding is beginning to emerge, but whilst this is positive, it is important not to forget care-experienced adults who did not benefit from this support. If care experience is not recognized as lifelong, some care-experienced adults, including this author, would be denied the chance to heal, to reclaim their identity, and to take their place in society—not just as someone who survived, but as someone who is valued, supported, and who belongs. This experience underscores the importance of reframing both language and policy. It shows what becomes possible when care-experienced people are seen not as “former” or “past” anything—but as active contributors whose voices and futures matter.

4.3. Educational Equity for Care-Experienced Learners to Succeed

Personal experiences of navigating education as a care-experienced learner enable consideration of how these insights connect with existing research and policy developments around access, equity, and support. Education provides a compelling lens to explore the social and structural implications of language. Care-experienced people are more likely to have non-linear educational journeys, often returning to education later in life (UCAS, 2022). Disruption—frequent moves, changing schools, and the emotional burden of instability—can deeply impact academic progress. Despite this, through self-efficacy and perseverance, care-experienced learners cultivate strengths that support meaningful engagement (Schwartz-Tayri et al., 2025). When these personal strengths are matched with external scaffolding—such as advocacy, financial support, and relational networks—the authors argue that, only then, genuine progress becomes possible. Success, then, is not simply a matter of personal effort. It also depends on systems that respond to complex journeys. Education becomes not only a route to qualification, but to healing, recognition, and restored self-confidence and potential—especially when barriers are removed rather than reinforced.

In 2020, Scotland launched a national advocacy helpline for care-experienced people, with no upper age limit—the only service of its kind at the time (WhoCares? Scotland, 2023). Most callers were twenty-six or older, with education and finance as top concerns. Policy changes have followed. Prior to the 2020–2021 academic year, eligibility for the Care-Experienced Student Bursary was limited to students under twenty-six. That age cap was removed, broadening access to financial support for care-experienced learners of all ages (Scottish Funding Council, 2020). These changes are more than policy updates—they are tangible examples of scaffolding that reduce barriers and create lasting opportunity. However, while this support is no longer restricted by age, it does still restrict opportunity. The Care-Experienced Student Bursary is not extended to postgraduate study, therefore suggesting a view that students with care experience no longer experience disadvantage, compared to their peers, when progressing through postgraduate study. This barrier has practical and emotional impacts on care-experienced people, once again containing rather than supporting opportunity. Good scaffolding is relational, consistent, and adaptable. It recognizes that recovery, growth, and aspiration do not follow a fixed timeline. It challenges the assumption that opportunities must come early—or not at all.

Success is the “process of journeying towards greater success” (van Breda et al., 2012). That journey is enriched not just by academic progress but by the scaffolding that has made participation—and possibility—visible. While gaining a qualification is a meaningful milestone, true success lies in walking a path filled with opportunity and hope. As more organizations acknowledge care experience as a lifelong reality, efforts to help learners of all ages get in, stay in, or return to education are growing (Moore et al., 2025). In 2018 the Hub for Success was founded in Edinburgh, a collaborative partnership organization that offers care-experienced people of all ages tailored advice, advocacy, and relational support to enable access, participation, and progression in further and higher education (Hub for Success, 2025). This changing landscape affirms the power of language, lived experience, and compassionate systems. When scaffolding is thoughtfully designed and consistently applied, it enables the determination and potential of the care-experienced community to flourish. Success is not found by arriving at a destination—but by being on a journey of possibility.

4.4. Mental Wellbeing, Family and Connection

Success is an inherently subjective and evolving concept, shaped by cultural, social, and personal factors. This section draws from lived experience of emotional wellbeing, trauma, and reconnection—exploring how these themes are reflected in wider research of mental health, attachment, and recovery in the context of care. The authors’ experiences suggest that for individuals with care-experience, dominant societal narratives of success—often framed in terms of academic achievement, stable employment, or financial security—can feel not only distant but misaligned with lived realities. Instead, the authors suggest that for many care-experienced people, success is more accurately understood through the lens of wellbeing, encompassing emotional safety, relational stability, and self-acceptance.

The lasting effects of trauma, separation, and disrupted attachments often compound across time, making emotional wellbeing one of the most meaningful yet elusive forms of post-care success (Stein, 2012; Sanders, 2020). Achieving this kind of wellbeing is rarely straightforward. Access to appropriate mental health support remains a persistent issue, with many care-experienced individuals encountering long waiting lists, inconsistent provision, or time-limited interventions that fail to address the depth of their needs (Munro, 2011). The absence of timely, trauma-informed care can exacerbate distress and reinforce feelings of abandonment. Effective mental health provision for this group must be holistic and sustained. While formal therapeutic services are vital, they must be complemented by informal supports that offer consistency, empathy, and trust. Relationships with trusted adults, peers with shared experience, or communities built around understanding care experience serve as crucial scaffolding—buffering against isolation and validating identity (SAMHSA, 2014). These relational supports foster belonging and emotional resilience, reinforcing that recovery is not an individual task, but a shared process grounded in connection.

The authors reflect that reconnection with family, while complex and not always appropriate, can represent significant personal and relational growth. For some, this may involve renewed contact; for others, it may mean reshaping the meaning of family altogether. Crucially, such processes require careful, tailored scaffolding. Where supportive services are in place, they can enable families to reconstruct healthier dynamics built on mutual respect, understanding, and healing.

Care-experienced individuals require systems across all domains of practice that are responsive to their histories, context, and evolving needs. Success, then, is not achieved in isolation—it is scaffolded through relationships, policy, and practices that are stable, attuned, and empowering. The authors articulate, it may manifest in conventional achievements like a degree certificate, but it may also appear in quieter milestones—a day free of anxiety, a safe home, or a phone call with someone you trust. Each is valid. What unites them is the presence of structures that believe in and invest in care-experienced people’s potential to grow and thrive. With sustained and relationally driven support, care-experienced individuals can not only define success on their own terms but actively realize it. Recognizing this reality demands a reorientation of systems from reactive intervention to proactive, lifelong scaffolding—one that honors complexity and upholds the right to wellbeing.

5. Discussion

This article has foregrounded the learning derived from the lived experiences of the authors in articulating what success means and what supports are needed to make it possible. Through a collaborative and reflexive approach, the authors suggest that when scaffolding is comprehensive, enduring, and relational, care experience need not be a barrier to success. Indeed, it is not care experience itself that limits outcomes, but rather the absence—or insufficiency—of the systems, relationships, and resources surrounding it. To foster success in education, wellbeing, relationships, and personal development, transitions must be reimagined not as cliff edges, but as bridges, supported by strong scaffolding that continues well beyond statutory responsibilities ending.

The analysis of language and policy offers a valuable reminder that words matter. The shift from terms such as looked-after child to care-experienced is not merely semantic; it represents a reframing that influences how individuals are perceived and supported. Personal reflections reinforce the significance of relationship-based practice as a foundational element of support. Policy frameworks, however progressive, are insufficient without people—teachers, social workers, mentors, friends—who are consistent, emotionally attuned, and willing to walk alongside people as they navigate life after care.

This argument is not hypothetical. Scotland’s own initiatives demonstrate what is possible when scaffolding is done well. The Hub for Success, for instance, has developed an innovative model for widening access to education through no-barrier, relationally grounded support for care-experienced learners of all ages (Hub for Success, 2025). Similarly, the ongoing advocacy and research of CELCIS continue to highlight the importance of co-designed, rights-based approaches that place lived experience at the heart of care system reform (CELCIS, 2025). These models are not simply good practice; they are evidence that transformational support is possible when scaffolding is prioritized over bureaucracy.

This article also sits within a broader movement of care-experienced authorship and advocacy gaining recognition across disciplines. Journalist Sophia Alexandra Hall, for example, developed the Media Toolkit for Journalists and Care-Experienced People (Hall, 2024), a trauma-informed resource now adopted by major UK newsrooms. In Wales, care-experienced parents from CASCADE co-authored an article in the British Journal of Social Work, illustrating how lived experience can strengthen the quality and ethical depth of research (CASCADE, 2025; Holland et al., 2025). These contributions reflect a growing recognition of care-experienced individuals as knowledge producers, not just subjects of policy.

While these examples mark promising shifts, care-experienced authorship remains the exception rather than the norm. Much of the academic and policy literature continues to speak about care-experienced people, rather than with or through them. This article challenges that imbalance by placing lived experience at the center of both its method and message. In redefining success from within care-experience, it also challenges dominant societal metrics. Success is too often equated with employment, qualifications, or income. While these may matter, they do not reflect the full complexity of thriving after care. For many, success lies in creating a safe home, cultivating joy, healing from trauma, or forming lasting relationships. These outcomes are no less valid, and they deserve to be recognized and supported. True equity demands recognition for all forms of success, not just those that align with dominant social or institutional norms.

6. Conclusions

This article argues that successful transitions from care should not hinge on extraordinary resilience, but on the strength of the scaffolding that surrounds each individual. When support is consistent, relational, and enduring, success becomes not a rare exception but a reachable reality. Defined in diverse and deeply personal ways, every expression of success is equally valid and deserves to be championed.

Moving forward, the challenge for policymakers, educators, practitioners, and researchers is to listen—and respond. Listening means accepting that care experience does not end, that success is personal and evolving, and that scaffolding is not a luxury but a necessity. Responding means funding services that prioritize relationships over referrals, remove arbitrary age limits, and embedding trauma-informed, rights-based principles across all domains of support. Above all, it means understanding that care-experienced people do not need to be extraordinary to succeed—they simply need systems that work.

While this article is grounded in the lived and professional experiences of its three authors, we acknowledge the limitations of this approach. Our reflections offer depth but do not represent the full diversity of care-experienced perspectives. Future research would benefit from including a wider range of voices, particularly through participatory or empirical methodologies that expand the evidence base. Co-produced studies that involve larger samples of care-experienced people could further strengthen understanding and contribute to more inclusive, system wide change.

As Scotland continues to implement The Promise, the stories and insights in this article offer a clear benchmark: if the scaffolding is strong, no one should fall. And if no one falls, then success—on one’s own terms—is not only possible but probable. This article’s insights, though rooted in Scotland’s context, offer a globally relevant call to embed lifelong, relational, and rights-based scaffolding into care systems everywhere, ensuring care-experienced individuals are supported to thrive on their own terms. The future we envision is not aspirational. It is achievable. But it requires courage: to dismantle what no longer serves, to rebuild alongside those who have lived its consequences, and to commit—fully and unapologetically—to a world where care-experience is not a barrier, but a chapter of a story met with dignity, support, and respect.