Recovery Resources for College Students: Leveraging Web Scraping to Unveil Current Estimates

Objective: Growing recognition of the importance of addressing substance use among emerging adults has led to a rapid expansion of recovery services on college campuses. However, existing estimates on collegiate recovery programs or communities (CRPs/Cs) and other services are outdated or lack rigor, leaving the extent of these resources unclear. This study aimed to fill this gap in our understanding by providing current estimates of recovery-related resources. Method: Utilizing the Python web scraping library BeautifulSoup, we gathered a large sample of “.edu”-hosted webpages (N = 995) with references to recovery services (e.g., “collegiate recovery”, “peer support”). Eligible webpages (n = 552) were screened by a team of 11 reviewers to extract information on these services. Results: During extraction, we identified 270 institutions that advertised on-campus recovery services for students. Of these institutions, 176 advertised formal CRPs/Cs. A majority of CRPs/Cs (n = 164) advertised mutual aid meetings and sober/drug-free social activities (n = 138), while only 83 advertised drop-in centers. Relatively few historically Black colleges or universities (n = 5), Hispanic-serving institutions (n = 21), or native-serving institutions (n = 0) hosted recovery services. Conclusions: On-campus services to support recovery have greatly expanded since previous estimates, but gaps may exist in the services provided by these programs. By providing an updated estimate and examining service uniformity, this study can aid in future expansion and standardization efforts to support students in recovery.