Institutional Assurances and Certifications

The Institutional Assurances and Certifications component of the Institution Profile contains data elements that compose assurance/certification information about an institution (e.g., Human Subjects Assurance Number, Institutional Review Board [IRB] Approval Date, IRB Type, Animal Welfare Assurance Number, and Institutional Animal Care & Use Committee [IACUC] Unacknowledged Certification Explanation). The screen provides a means of viewing and managing the checklist of these assurances and certifications.

This component of the Institution Profile is viewable by clicking the Assurances & Certifications link on the dashboard or the Assurances and Certifications tab from the Commons menu structure. For most users, the information is read-only, however, if you hold a Commons SO role, you have the ability to edit the information. Regardless of your role, the default view of the Institutional Assurances and Certifications is read-only.

There are two main sections of the screen, which are described below: Status and Assurances and Certifications.

Status

The Status section of the screen displays the Office of Research and Integrity Certification Status for the institution. The values for this field are either Assurance OK or Expired. The expired status will display in red text as a warning.

The expiration date of the certification displays below the status, in red text if already expired.

Assurances and Certifications

The Assurances and Certification section provides a means for institutions to indicate (or view the indication of) compliance with particular laws, policies, and/or regulations as well as to indicate that it meets certain research requirements.

The list is available for viewing by anyone who has access to the Institution Profile. Read-only check marks display next to each assurance or certification in the list along with the date on which the institution indicated compliance.

Policy: Not all assurances and certifications may be applicable to each institution.

For detailed information about assurances:

1. Access the current Grants Policy Statement here (HTML or PDF): https://grants.nih.gov/policy/nihgps/index.htm

2. Once you are in the statement, search for "PUBLIC POLICY REQUIREMENTS" or even the name of a particular assurance, such as "smoke-free workplace" or "civil rights".

Editing the Assurances and Certifications

If you hold the SO role within an organization, you can edit the assurance and certification indicators in the Institution Profile.

To edit the indicators, click the Edit Assurances and Certifications button at the top of the screen.

The assurance and certification indicators display over several categories.

Check or uncheck the certification and/or assurance indicator(s) as appropriate. You can also click the (explain your answer) link to access a text box in which you can provide additional information.

When you are done, click the Save All button at the top or bottom of the profile to save the changes. If you do not wish to save your changes, click the Discard Changes button instead.

Click here for a sample image.

Only signing official (SO) users can edit the Institution Profile, except for institutions that have a TTO administrator but no signing official, in which case, the TTO administrator can edit. For institutions with both an SO and TTO administrator, the TTO administrator can edit only the Extramural Technology Transfer Administration component.

Only SOs can see the Policy Documents tab, which contains the financial conflict of interest policy.