About Berkeley eProtocol The administrative burden of research projects is time consuming and expensive. A primary goal of the Office for Research Administration and Compliance (RAC) is the active pursuit of practices that will minimize administrative burden on faculty, while ensuring compliance with the pertinent laws, rules, and regulations that govern research. For this reason, RAC has acquired and developed the Key Solutions Inc. eProtocol System with funding from the Campus Technology Council (CTC). eProtocol is a user-friendly research compliance management system designed to support the administration of research involving human or animal subjects, replacing the current paper-based processes with a web-based system accessible via any desktop. We expect that the implementation of Berkeley eProtocol will: (1) reduce the burden on faculty, staff, and students related to preparing, submitting, and maintaining animal and human research protocols; (2) permit department administrators to spend more time in direct support of principal investigators; and (3) free researchers to devote more of their time to conducting research and other academic pursuits. Berkeley eProtocol will provide researchers with a common user interface for the web-based preparation and management of Committee for Protection of Human Subjects (CPHS) and Animal Care and Use Committee (ACUC) protocols. The system will automate CPHS and ACUC workflow and operations, management of review committees, and provide electronic protocol preparation, submission, routing, review, tracking, approval, and closeout. Berkeley eProtocol is also designed to integrate closely with the Coeus contract and grant system that supports the Sponsored Projects Office (SPO) and Conflict of Interest (CoI) operations to enable a cross-functional view of administrative data for principal investigators and staff, relating protocols with proposals, awards, and CoI transactions. Berkeley eProtocol is a collaborative effort involving all Research Administration and Compliance Units – ACUC, CPHS, SPO and CoI – with technical support and project management from RAC Information Systems. Committee Chairs and members, researchers, administrators and other research staff are also involved in the development, configuration, and review of the system workflow. The Berkeley eProtocol system will be rolled out over the coming months, starting with exempt applications and expanding to expedited and full committee applications. |