Office of Research and Sponsored Programs

In short, approximately 2-6 weeks, depending on the type of review, the number of revisions requested, and how long you take to revise and resubmit the application.

Please see the IRB Process for more details on review and approval information. 

1. receive an IRB application by email, 

2. assigned a reviewer, 

3. reviewer’s comments are sent to the research by the IRB chair outlining the necessary changes to their application (it is rare that no changes are necessary)

4. IRB chair or IRB Program Associate reviews changes against the reviewer comments and either asks for additional changes or provides email approval pending a formal letter of approval

5. Formal letter of approval is sent by IRB office within about two weeks of email approval 

Students are not permitted to be Principal Investigators. Your professor is required to be the Principal Investigator to ensure sound research design, proper completion of the application, and project follow-through.

On the IRB application, you should check the box indicating you are a student. 

Yes. The PI is repsonsible for the project, even it is mostly run by a student. A faculty advisor is responsible for ensuring sound research design, proper completion of the application, and project follow-through. 

Anyone listed on the project is required to take CITI training. 

Personnel is anyone working on the project in any of the 6 capacities listed (PI included). 

The roles for research personnel are: 1) research design, 2) recruitment, 3) informed consent, 4) data collection, 5) data analysis, 6) Other (indicate role)

IRB determines minimal risk. Minimal risk means that the probability and magnitude of harm or discomfort anticipated in the research are not greater in and of themselves than those ordinarily encountered in daily life of the general population or during the performance of routine physical or psychological examinations or tests.

Information collected for research purposes must remain confidential at all times. You need to protect your research data whether it's electronic or paper. If you are doing a mail survey, for example, you need to keep the returned forms, even if they do not have identifiable information on them in a locked file cabinet or office. If you are doing an electronic survey through Qualtrics, you need to keep the data on a password protected computer.

Data must be retained for 7 years, then destroyed.

You will need to describe in your IRB application how the interviews are recorded, transcribed, etc., where the recordings and transcriptions are stored and inaccessible to all but PIs and researcher. Usually, researchers use a computer that is password protected

Yes, you would need to reapply. It helps if when you re-apply that you meet the previous requests and provide context of the previous review. It may help the review go faster.

Your informed consent form should include contact information for the researcher in case of questions and for the IRB chair in case of complaints. Consent forms and concern/complaint forms are on the website.

When you are done collecting data, and the data is DE-IDENTIFIED, you can consider the research complete. For students (undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral), this step is one of the last things you will do prior to graduating. There is a completion form on the IRB forms and documents webpage.

Many times, projects are completed prior to their expiration date. This allows the PI to complete their project with IRB and reduce administrative burden on our part

How you go about contacting and getting permission is outside IRB’s purview. You must approach them with your project. Permission can be provided before submission, during submission, or after approval. If it is post-approval, your letter will state the project cannot begin without approval from the site. Site permission documents (emails, letters, etc.) must be submitted to the IRB for filing as soon as received.

This question is not straightforward to answer. Generally, full board research protocols have participants considered vulnerable in some way, such as minors.

Your research may fall under one of eight (8) exempt categories or one of nine (9) expedited categories.

The IRB office will determine the category of your research. The most important distinction is whether it is full board or not.

Review categories are listed in your approval letter.

If the data you are collecting is related to education, FERPA must be observed. FERPA training (available through CITI) is required prior to collecting data.

If you are conducting research within a school setting, it will depend on the school. The researcher needs site consent.

Almost all research with minors (FERPA-related or not) will trigger a full board review. We will want to make sure the students' names and all related information are kept confidential and private. After the data is collected, personal information should be separated from collected data (name for example). If race and age are important to the research design, you need to explain what demographic information you need to retain in order to carry out your analysis.

Consent is always required for research, and in the case of minors, this includes their parents. Parents must give consent, and students must also assent in order to participate. In other words, two consents must occur prior to participation. 

If you are working with students directly, your IRB application will have a full board review. We will look to see level of risk, confidentiality and privacy issues pertaining to students.

In order to work with protected educational information and/or demographics, there must be a legitimate educational interest to use it. 

Data must be un-identifiable to be used without consent. There can be no trace connecting to a student in any way.

Using student assignments as data is allowed if there is a legitimate educational need, but informed consent must be obtained from the students.

Using past student assignments when no informed consent was obtained is not allowed. 

Student information and work, including assignments are covered by FERPA, and thus, cannot be used unless the researcher obtained permission from the students to use their work/assignments as research. FERPA is a federal requirement; non-compliance of FERPA results in loss of funding for the University.

For more information on what is or isn't protect by FERPA, view the FERPA Training Document on the IRB Forms & Documents webpage.

There would be an investigation, a report to the Federal Government is likely. The PI needs to make sure that non-compliance does not occur as they are the responsible party.

Following the approved protocol is the best way of mitigating unexpected events or concerns. 

Funding is up to you. If you are a student, contact OSCAR and work with your faculty advisor. Faculty and staff can contact ORSP for help with funding searches.

This question is vague. It depends on a number of factors. Is it a class project? (If so, see SOP 2-Class Assignments) What do you intend to do with the data/results? The goals and/or project must be designed before many of the application questions can be answered. 

If you are unsure how your research fits within IRB, click here to better understand Research and the IRB Relationship.