Approval Process

Any research involving human subjects must receive prior approval from the Institutional Review Board (IRB). The sole exceptions are for:

• Faculty supervised classroom projects on educational practices in which students volunteer to use themselves as the research subjects;
• Anonymous one-time educational tests limited to innocuous items such as perceptions of non-personal matters; and
• Demographic, marketing, and program evaluation information routinely collected by the University.

Projects in these three categories do not require IRB approval as they are not considered research by the Code of Federal Regulations, 45 CFR 46.102d.

The goal of the IRB is to make the proposal review process as quick and efficient as possible. If you are planning a project in the future in which you are the principle investigator (PI) the following are the basic steps you’ll need to take to get IRB approval:

1. PI accesses proposal forms on IRB website
2. PI completes proposal forms & online training
3. PI submits forms and training certificate to IRB Chair
4. Proposal is reviewed by committee
5. IRB Chair contacts PI regarding decision
6. PI receives letter of approval/rejection
7. Proposal status tracking available online

Proposals must be submitted for review no less than four weeks before the commencement of data collection.

All student researchers who involve human subjects in a research project must have a member of the Texas Wesleyan faculty act as the faculty sponsor for the research. The faculty member is responsible for ensuring that the student researcher takes proper precautions to protect the rights and welfare of volunteer participants and assists with the IRB proposal completion and submission processes.

The collection of information from research participants for the purpose of class discussion or for the purpose of training students in research methods generally does not require IRB review. Use the University’s definition of “what is research” above to help discern if IRB review is warranted.