The Office for Human Subjects Protection (OHSP) requires that all "key personnel" in a proposed research project, whether FSU faculty, staff, students (graduate or undergraduate), or outside collaborating researchers, complete the Collaborative Institutional Training Initiative (CITI) Human Subjects Research (HSR) training before protocols for research can be approved by the IRB. "Key personnel" includes all study personnel and research assistants who are engaged. Engaged individuals are people who will obtain consent/assent, will have interactions (i.e. data collection, recruitment, etc.) with research participants, or will have access to identifiable private research data.

NOTE:  Effective September 26, 2018, the NIH will no longer be providing their version of the Human Subjects Training course.  Therefore, after this date, CITI training will be required by the FSU OHSP.

***CITI training must be re-certified every three years.***

Directions for accessing and signing up for the correct CITI course(s): The CITI website offers many different kinds of training, not all are required. The correct training is specifically called “Human Subjects Research (HSR)” training, which contains the required modules for protecting human subjects. Any other type of training from CITI will be missing required modules, therefore, your certificate must say “Human Subjects Research” training to be valid. In order to enroll in the correct modules, please follow these instructions:

1. Register or log in to the CITI Program Website
2. Affiliate with “Florida State University” and select the option to “Add a Course.”
3. Nine questions will prompt you to choose which courses you’d like to register for. The first six questions are optional, supplemental training modules, please answer them accordingly. The 8^th & 9^th questions are also optional, but recommended.
4. The 7th question asks if you are required to complete the HSR Training. Here you must select one of the “FSU Faculty, Staff, and Students” options in order to access the appropriate required training.

NOTE:  Responsible Conduct of Research training, Conflicts of Interest training, Health Information Privacy & Security training & Good Clinical Practice training are NOT the same as HSR training, these certificates (and other supplemental modules) are not valid to satisfy this requirement.

Note: Always check with your sponsor regarding human subjects research training requirements.  There are specific requirements for NIH, FDA, and other sponsored human subjects research that will require additional trainings to be completed.  Please contact The Office of Research Compliance Programs (ORCP) at FSU to ensure these required trainings are completed as appropriate.  The ORCP may be contacted by phone at 850-644-8648 or email at research-compliance@fsu.edu

Institutional Affiliation: For researchers new to the University who have completed CITI training and who are transferring projects to FSU, current training certificates are required with initial project transfer. Once the project and PI have transferred to FSU, the institutional affiliation within the CITI account must be updated to FSU. The affiliation with "Florida State University" must be initiated to access the correct modules. Evidence of having completed Human Subjects Protections training must be provided to the OHSP when an application is submitted for IRB review.

The OHSP can be contacted at humansubjects@fsu.edu or (850) 644-7900 for clarification and assistance with human subjects research training.  

Guidance on HIPAA Privacy and Research