Institutional Review Board
Purpose: The Institutional Review Board (IRB) is comprised of four faculty members and a community member (with no affiliation to the College). The IRB is designed to protect the rights and safety, as well as the emotional and physical well-being, of human research participants. Research involving human participants conducted by faculty, students, and staff must be evaluated by the IRB.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services requires all colleges and universities to have IRBs in order to protect human participants involved in research. It is the responsibility of those IRBs to ensure that investigators comply with the relevant federal regulations and ethical guidelines set forth by the Office for Human Research Protections (OHRP).
Process: It is the responsibility of the lead researcher on any project to submit a proposal for IRB approval prior to commencing the research project. This submission must be complete and accurate in order for approval to be granted and in order to adhere to the given timelines.
The IRB reviews research proposals from all members of the Cedar Crest College community (faculty, staff, and students) and researchers from other institutions.
Before submitting an application for IRB review, please visit the relevant links listed in the sidebar for information about the types of review, the submission process, and other pertinent information.
The lead researcher on the proposal should submit the application for review. The required forms are found below. The forms must be downloaded and submitted as attachments with the research application. No proposal will be reviewed without the proper forms attached.
All IRB Proposals are submitted using the IRB email ():
Complete the requested application information and the applicable forms.
IRB Request for IRB Approval (Form): This document is in a fillable PDF format that allows you to download and fill in responses. The entire form must be completed for all submissions.
IRB Research Description Supplement (Template): This document is in a format that allows researchers to download and edit. The IRB Research Description Supplement Form is required for all submissions.
IRB Consent Form (Template): This document is in a format that allows researchers to download and edit. The IRB Consent Form is required for all submissions except those involving secondary analysis of existing data or projects involving deception. A copy of the consent form should be provided to participants to keep for their records for in-person research. When conducting online survey research, the informed consent form must be included on the first page of the online survey. The first survey question must ask the participant to indicate that they have read the informed consent form and agree to participate.