Dear Investigator,
The IACUC is pleased to offer our IUP research community another of our IACUC "Memos to Investigators," an irregular e-mail series used to provide updates and information we hope will be useful to our research community.
1) New student animal care and use training policy
As you are aware, in December of 2014 the IUP Senate approved a new policy that requires any IUP student engaged in systematic activities involving vertebrate animals to first complete training which covers both the practices which are allowed as well as the relevant policies which are in place to guide such activities.
Through its contract with the Collaborative Institutional Training Initiative (CITI), IUP has made available a series of Animal Care and Use (ACU) training modules, and the IUP IACUC has identified a subset of those modules which will satisfy the student training requirement.
The web interface to the CITI offerings is somewhat complicated, and often difficult for new users to navigate. The IUP School of Graduate Studies and Research has provided some training materials to assist users in establishing a CITI account and linking their affiliation to IUP. These materials can be found online.
Please note the following:
1A
There are a wide variety of different ACU training courses and modules, offered under several different user categories. While many of these may be useful, students are required to complete only:
Students working with captive animals (laboratory researchers)
or
Students working with wild animals (field researchers)
If your students have difficulty locating these specific training modules, I would be happy to assist them.
1B
At this time, there is no universitywide mandate that requires all faculty involved in activities involving vertebrate animals to first complete ACU training. [ Exception: our deans can, and have, required some individual faculty to complete training]. Nonetheless, faculty are encouraged to avail themselves of the training to ensure that their activities, and those of their students, are fully compliant.
1C
Students engaged in classroom activities involving vertebrate animals as a regular part of course instruction do not have to complete individual ACU training. It is expected instead that the instructors of any course involving vertebrate animals have an approved animal use teaching protocol in place.
1D
There is no need for students or faculty to forward to me or the IACUC their CITI training completion certificatesthe relevant personnel receive them automatically.
As always, the IACUC is here to serve our IUP research community. Please do not hesitate to contact us with any questions or concerns.
Questions or concerns? E-mail them to iacuc-info@iup.edu.