Any research conducted by faculty, staff or students involving human subjects must come before the Institutional Review Board (IRB) for review and approval. Please explore the Types of Research and Review section for more information.
Required training certification
Any individual included on a protocol as research personnel must have an updated, valid Collaborative Institutional Training Initiative (CITI) certification in the appropriate area with ¿Û¿ÛÄÛ±ÆAA listed as the institution of affiliation. CITI training from other institutions does not satisfy this requirement, and your training must be updated every five years. Please click here for specific directions about how to complete the online CITI tutorial.
Faculty advisor training
If you are advising student research, you must be listed as a student’s project Co-PI on their protocol and must have the appropriate training to oversee the research. For example, if your student is doing a dissertation in Social & Behavioral Research, then that is the correct training to attach to the protocol submission. A Biomedical Research certification will not cover you. It is possible that a researcher may need both Biomedical and Social & Behavioral CITI Training based on research aims explored by the researcher and his/her associated collaborators or students.
Data sharing
Any individual who will see identifiable research data you will collect must be listed on your IRB protocol as personnel and complete CITI Training. You may not share raw data with anyone who is not on your IRB protocol.
Appropriate data collection platforms
¿Û¿ÛÄÛ±ÆAA prohibits the use of Google products for data collection. As a member of the Concordia community, you are provided access to the ¿Û¿ÛÄÛ±ÆAA Qualtrics platform and should use that for data collection. Your account includes many useful features including data analysis! Visit the ¿Û¿ÛÄÛ±ÆAA Portal to request your account.
Pre-research approval
Human subjects research cannot start before the ¿Û¿ÛÄÛ±ÆAA IRB has reviewed and approved the project. It is the responsibility of the researcher to allow ample time for this process.
Approval timeline
- Administrative and Exempt: The IRB administrator requires ten business days to process Administrative and Exempt protocol applications. The administrator will provide feedback and detail for any issues encountered, re-opening the protocol for the researcher to correct in Cayuse. Each time the protocol must be reopened to correct mistakes and request more information, the ten-day clock restarts. Administrative and Exempt protocols are reviewed on a rolling basis.
- Expedited: The IRB requires at least two weeks (fourteen business days) to process Expedited protocol applications. Expedited protocols are typically reviewed by two reviewers.
- Full Board: The IRB requires at least one month to process Full Board protocol applications. The IRB meets once per month to discuss and make decisions about these applications. Please consult the meeting schedule and required submission dates for a Full Board protocol. Researchers may be asked to briefly present their projects to the board if the IRB deems it necessary.
Existing IRB approval
Protocols already approved by an IRB of another institution should also be submitted to ¿Û¿ÛÄÛ±ÆAA’s IRB for recordkeeping. You will see options in Cayuse that allow you to upload your existing IRB approval information and skip other sections of the application for expedience. If you are not sure which IRB should be the IRB of Record, please contact us to discuss.
Approval expiration
An Exempt IRB approval is good for one calendar year. Expedited and Full Board approvals are good for three years. Thirty days before the end of your project term, you will receive an email from Cayuse reminding you to either renew or close your project. If you do not do so, your project will be administratively closed.
Research involving comfort dogs
Please see Policies for Research Studies Involving Comfort Dogs if you are planning to do any research involving the ¿Û¿ÛÄÛ±ÆAA comfort dogs.
Questions
If you have any questions, please contact irb@cuw.edu.