OU Norman Campus policy mandates that all faculty, staff, and students engaged in research involving human subjects complete both the initial certification and continuing education requirements as described below.
Initial Education Requirements
- Completion of the CITI (Collaborative IRB Training Initiative) Basic Web-Based Course is required. To register for the course, please follow the instructions HERE. If you already have a CITI account and you need to add your OU affiliation, please follow the instructions HERE.
Please note: We have other training modules on our CITI site that you are welcome to take – BUT the Social Behavioral Modules are the only CITI training OU and the IRB require.
The CITI Basic Course in the Protection of Human Research Subjects consists of modules covering social/behavioral research. Each module includes a brief quiz. The entire course takes approximately 4-6 hours to complete. The program allows users to log off and on multiple times in order to complete all modules. Therefore, you do not have to complete the entire training in one sitting. Users should print a completion report for their records. The program will automatically forward a copy of the report to the IRB office.
Continuing Education Requirement
- Completion of the CITI Refresher Web-Based Course is required every three years. To complete the refresher training, please log into: https://www.citiprogram.org/
The CITI Refresher Course is a comprehensive review of the basic modules covering social/behavioral topics. It includes updated material as it become available. The program will take several hours to complete, depending upon your familiarity with the material.
Your education status will be verified on a routine basis. Notification will be forwarded to you via email.
Please note...
- The iRIS submission system includes a CITI feed. When you sign off on your submission, you will receive a Workflow Tracking screen that informs you of any personnel who are not up-to-date within the system. Unfortunately, if your email address within iRIS does not match the email address associated with CITI, you may receive a false "Not Active" notice for CITI training. Do not worry, we have still received your submission and we will check all "Expired" and "Not Active" notices manually. You will receive a stipulation if we are unable to verify any of your noted key study personnel.
- The IRB CITI on-line training is separate from the campus-wide two-day Responsible Conduct of Research Training (RCR). RCR training has a broad emphasis on research integrity that includes, but is not limited to, protection of human research participants. The intent of the CITI training is to educate investigators specifically about human research participant protections and the federal regulations related to such protection, in order to improve the quality and safety of research conducted on the OU-Norman campus or other sites by OU-NC faculty, staff, and students. Although there may be minimal overlap, the coverage of human research protections is inadequate to serve as an alternative mode of certification for the CITI training.
The CITI training is required for all personnel conducting research with human participants at OU-NC. The refresher course/continuing education modules are required for every subsequent year.
Key research personnel required to complete the CITI training include:
- Faculty
- Staff
- Graduate students (working on a thesis or dissertation)
- Anyone using data for purposes of independent research
- Faculty sponsors
- Persons receiving grant monies for human subject research
- Those personnel with management responsibilities
Optional Training
Please contact us at irb@ou.edu to schedule the optional iRIS training. Note: This training will not replace the required CITI training.
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