The Cornell IRB is extending its human participant research training requirement to apply to Cornell study personnel involved in Exempt protocols. Training will be required for all Exempt protocols as of October 1, 2022. Cornell has recommended training for researchers involved in Exempt studies prior to this, but in order to bring our institution in line with current best practices in the field, training will now be required.
Below are key details about this change to our training requirement:
- Cornell study personnel involved in Exempt1 research protocols will need to complete the same online CITI Program Human Participant Research training as those research personnel involved in protocols that receive Expedited or Full Board IRB review.
- Either course titled "IRB Training" or "IRB Basic" will be accepted.
- The Cornell IRB Training course consists of a set of modules that can be completed one at a time, and the entire training usually takes 2-4 hours to complete.
- This training will need to be completed by October 1, 2022, and repeated every five (5) years.
- This requirement applies to all study personnel involved in existing, active Exempt protocols as of October 1, 2022, as well as new protocols determined to be Exempt on or after that date.
- As with Expedited and Full Board protocols, the IRB office will not issue an approval/exemption letter until training is complete for all study personnel.
- Protocol PIs will be responsible for ensuring their research team members stay in compliance with this training requirement.
- For study personnel who are not affiliated with Cornell, equivalent training will be accepted.
- If you are unsure if you have completed Cornell’s CITI training for human participant research within the past five years, you can review this list of Cornell IRB training records pulled directly from CITI, or log into the CITI Program website (Cornell SSO link) to check the details of your own course completion records.
- If you are unsure if your IRB protocol received Exempt review, you can search for your protocol(s) in RASS-IRB; check the field called “Review Type” for this information. For more help, see the RASS Guide Site How-To Guide for Finding an IRB Protocol.
We will send additional reminders about this new training requirement prior to its implementation date, and also post updated information to our website.
Thank you in advance for your cooperation. As always, feel free to reach out to the IRB office via irbhp@cornell.edu if you have any questions or concerns.
- 1Research eligible for Exempt review is a subset of human participant research that presents no more than minimal risk to participants, and fits within one or more categories defined by federal IRB regulations. Exempt research is covered by Cornell’s Human Research Protection Program, and handled via IRB Administrator review.