As our main point of contact at your institution, you will need to submit any required IRB materials for approval. You should list yourself as Primary Investigator (PI). Your IRB may ask for the names of others involved in the project. It is best to list any colleagues or student assistants at your institution who may be involved. For example, these may be individuals helping to send out emails or email reminders.

Possibly. Some IRBs require the PI (primary investigator) to complete an online research ethics training module. If you do not have this training, but a colleague does, consider listing the colleague as PI and yourself as a secondary researcher.

Every IRB is different. You may be asked to submit some or all of the following: a copy of the survey, copies of recruitment emails or materials, a description of the study and its risks/ benefits, or a list of your qualifications to manage the study at your institution. Except for the list of your own qualifications, we would be happy to provide these materials or examples for you. Please see below for the examples.

Inclusion criteria for Student Watch: age 18+, currently enrolled as a student at the institution, non-institutionalized, English speaking, and able to give consent.

Inclusion criteria for Faculty Watch: age 18+, currently employed as a teaching faculty member at the institution, non-institutionalized, English speaking, and able to give consent.

Exclusion criteria for Student Watch: students on leave from the institution.

Exclusion criteria for Faculty Watch: faculty currently on leave from the institution or not currently teaching courses.

Students or faculty who fail to meet these requirements are screened out of the online surveys.

Benefits: NACS offers cash incentives for student and faculty participation. These incentives are given to one randomly selected participant from each participating institution and one grand prize winner selected at random from all participants. In the past, these incentives have ranged between $50 and $100 per campus and $1,000 for the Student Watch grand prize. Please refer to your study recruitment materials or reach out to NACS to determine if these amounts have changed. If any additional prizes or other incentives for participation are offered, you should describe those for the IRB as well, including what they are and how a winner will be selected.  

An additional benefit is that colleges and universities can gain insight int what students need and want from their college stores and what factors determine how students obtain their course materials. This information can help institutions better tailor their services to the needs of students. For Faculty Watch, a related benefit is that each campus gains a better understanding of how faculty choose their course materials and what they may need from college stores, publishers, and their institutions to better meet their needs.

Risks: Since surveys are completed online and, in an environment, chosen by participants, absolute confidentiality cannot be guaranteed. All data are confidential. Results of any data analysis are reported only in the aggregate. No individual responses can be tied to particular institutions or people.  

We recommend the wording below, adjusted for the particular study in which you are participating:

The Student Watch survey was designed by the National Association of College Stores (NACS). A total of 20 to 25 campuses will participate in Student Watch. One person at each institution is the designated point of contact. This person serves as Primary Investigator (PI) at the institution.

[Here, describe how the PI (you) will email the survey and survey link to potential participants.  This might be through a listserv or other tools you have available.]

The initial email will be sent [list date or time frame here].

Reminder emails will be sent [list date or time frame here].

Data are collected with an online survey. The survey is housed on the Qualtrics survey research platform.  Participants access the survey using a link in their recruitment/ invite email. The survey is expected to take participants 30 minutes to complete, or less. All participation is voluntary. Participants can discontinue their participation at any time and skip any questions they choose. 

Survey data are analyzed using descriptive statistics, correlations, and regression analysis using standard statistical software.

These online surveys pose no or minimal risk of harm to participants. As a result, your IRB may decide that there is no requirement to document consent from participants. All participation is voluntary. Participants can discontinue their participation at any time and skip any questions they choose. Participants are provided information about the study both in requirement emails and at the beginning of the survey itself before any questions or asked or any data is collected. Choosing to continue with the survey implies consent.

If your IRB requests a more involved consent process, an informed consent page can be added to the beginning of either the faculty Watch survey or Student Watch survey. The page will list the study procedures, risks and benefits of participation, and the rights of participants. With this option, participants, must indicated whether they consent to the terms of informed consent page with a yes or no response. Only those selecting ‘yes’ proceed through the remainder of the survey. Participants can still discontinue their participation at any time and skip any questions they choose.  

Personal identifiers are items like name, address, phone number, etc. Participants are not required to provide this information in either our Student Watch or Faculty Watch surveys. These surveys are anonymous. In the Student Watch survey, we do ask students to enter their name and email address if they would like be to considered for the cash incentive (i.e. prize). This step is entirely voluntary and the survey states that this information is not required. These personal identifiers are kept in a file separate from all other data. All data files are maintained in password-protected server storage. No data is shared outside of the research team.

The following details do not need to be included in your IRB submission:

We also give students participating in Student Watch the option to provide their name and email address if they would like to be contacted by NACS for future research. This step is also entirely voluntary and the survey states that this information is not required. Personal identifiers are kept in a file separate from all other data. All data files are maintained in password protected server storage. No data is shared outside of the research team. Participation in any future research is voluntary and students may revoke their consent at any time by contacting NACS or simply ignoring communications from NACS. Lists of names and email addresses are maintained by NACS until the student’s graduation date. At that time, they are removed from all files.

All data are deidentified at the time of data collection. Results of any data analysis are reported only in the aggregate. No individual responses can be tied to particular institutions or people. Participants are encouraged to take the survey in a private location.