RESEARCH WITH PURPOSE.PROTECT PEOPLE.PUBLISH WITH INTEGRITY.
A university-wide pathway for ethical research, meaningful culminating projects, responsible scholarship, books, articles, public-facing work, and publication readiness.
Scholarship Is A Stewardship.
EMU expects research to be academically defensible, ethically responsible, useful beyond the classroom, and consistent with Christian commitments to truth, dignity, justice, service, and care for neighbor. Faith integration strengthens the purpose and ethical framework of research; it never permits coercion, distortion of evidence, predetermined conclusions, or avoidable harm.
Honor autonomy, privacy, consent, culture, spiritual freedom, and the dignity of every person affected by the work.
Reduce foreseeable harm, design responsibly, and pursue knowledge or practical outcomes worth the risks and burdens involved.
Do not exploit convenient, vulnerable, subordinate, or underserved populations simply because they are easy to access.
Report what the evidence shows—including null, unexpected, or inconvenient findings—without fabrication, falsification, or plagiarism.
What EMU’s Internal Review Is — And Is Not
EMU uses an internal Research Ethics & Scholarly Integrity (RESI) Review to classify projects, evaluate institutional risk, protect participants, review data and publication plans, document academic clearance, and determine whether outside review is required.
EMU does not represent this internal process as a federally registered Institutional Review Board (IRB). Accreditation status is not what determines whether a project requires IRB or other independent ethics review. Requirements can arise from federal or state law, funding, a collaborating institution, a sponsor, a journal or publisher, a professional standard, or the country or jurisdiction where research occurs.
When external IRB or ethics review is required, EMU internal clearance is not a substitute. The researcher must obtain the required external determination or approval and provide documentation to EMU before recruitment, consent, intervention, or data collection begins.
Do not collect data first and ask for ethics clearance later. EMU will not backdate clearance, recreate consent after the fact, or describe unreviewed human-participant research as having been prospectively approved. A project that starts without required review may be ineligible for use in a culminating project or publication.
“…what doth the LORD require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?” — Micah 6:8 KJV
From Idea To Impact — In Order.
The process is designed to prevent the most common ethics and publication problems before they happen. Students and faculty should classify the project before collecting information, identify the intended public or scholarly use early, and keep the same approved scope from proposal through dissemination.
State the question, community need, practice problem, knowledge gap, or opportunity. Explain why it matters beyond earning a grade.
Identify intended societal contribution, affected stakeholders, ethical concerns, and how Christian worldview informs service without predetermining findings.
Confirm academic level, methodology, feasibility, literature base, intended deliverable, and whether the work is research, evaluation, creative scholarship, or professional practice.
Determine whether the project uses people, private data, sensitive topics, vulnerable populations, interventions, organizations, or external publication.
Provide project summary, tools, recruitment language, consent, data plan, organizational permission, external review documents, and publication intentions as applicable.
Do not begin until the required EMU determination and any external IRB/ethics approval or partner authorization are documented.
Use only approved tools, populations, locations, procedures, data fields, and consent language. Submit changes before implementing them.
Protect records, report incidents, complete the Impact & Translation Plan, pass publication-integrity review, and disseminate findings responsibly.
A strong idea is not yet an approved protocol. Recruitment posts, surveys, interviews, focus groups, observations, pilot testing, testimonial collection, private-data access, and intervention activity count as starting the project. Obtain the required written determination first.
Know Your Review Path Before You Begin.
This tool provides an initial EMU routing recommendation. It is not legal advice and does not itself issue IRB approval, exemption, or final institutional clearance. When uncertainty remains, submit the project for a written determination before beginning.
The researcher should not make a final external-IRB or legal determination alone when a project is ambiguous. Submit the project to EMU for institutional classification and, where necessary, obtain review from an appropriately qualified external body.
Protect People Before Protecting The Project.
Surveys, interviews, focus groups, observations, usability testing, testimonials, ministry evaluations, coaching pilots, community programs, and private records can create ethical duties even when the work is low risk. Consent, privacy, power relationships, and the future use of data must be addressed before participation begins.
Voluntary Informed Consent
Participants should understand what they are being asked to do, why, for how long, foreseeable risks, privacy limits, how data may be used, whom to contact, and that participation is voluntary.
- No hidden academic, employment, ministry, financial, or spiritual penalty for declining.
- Consent must use language the participant can reasonably understand.
- Permission to participate is not automatically permission to publish a name, image, testimony, or quote.
Power & Undue Influence
Extra safeguards are required when the researcher is also the participant’s pastor, professor, employer, supervisor, counselor, coach, ministry leader, or service provider.
- Use an independent recruiter or consent process when feasible.
- Do not recruit people who may believe participation is expected to preserve a relationship or benefit.
- Grades, services, employment, church participation, and pastoral care must not depend on joining the study.
Privacy & Confidentiality
Collect the minimum information necessary. Separate identities from research data whenever feasible and explain clearly when anonymity cannot be promised.
- Do not promise “anonymous” data if names, emails, IP addresses, video, voice, faces, or indirect identifiers can reveal identity.
- Do not use public links, shared folders, or unencrypted devices for sensitive participant data.
- Do not upload identifiable participant data into public or consumer AI tools.
Emotional, Spiritual & Social Risk
Research can harm reputation, relationships, employment, ministry standing, emotional wellbeing, or spiritual wellbeing even when there is no physical procedure.
- Use trauma-sensitive wording and allow participants to skip questions or stop.
- Have appropriate referral or support information when foreseeable distress may occur.
- Do not present research participation as spiritually superior or as evidence of faithfulness.
Green Pathway
May qualify for streamlined institutional documentation when no external rule applies.
- Literature or systematic reviews using published sources
- Theological, historical, conceptual, or philosophical scholarship
- Publicly available aggregate data with no reasonable route to identify individuals
- Software, curriculum, policy, or design projects not tested on people
Yellow Pathway
Requires careful review and may require external ethics/IRB determination before activity.
- Surveys, interviews, focus groups, observations, or recorded sessions
- Student, employee, client, congregant, patient, or ministry-participant data
- Case studies, testimonials, identifiable stories, or private communications
- Research intended for external scholarly publication using participant data
Red Pathway
Not authorized through EMU internal clearance alone. Some designs are outside the scope of student research altogether.
- Clinical trials, drugs, medical devices, medication changes, invasive procedures
- High-risk mental-health or trauma interventions
- Prisoners, impaired consent capacity, or minors in sensitive/high-risk studies
- Identifiable health records, biological specimens, or regulated protected data without appropriate authority
Do Not Do These Things.
These practices can invalidate a project, harm people, create publication problems, or expose the researcher and institution to avoidable risk.
EMU does not currently provide a federal IRB, animal care and use committee, clinical research infrastructure, or equivalent regulated review body. Projects that require such oversight must be conducted through an appropriately qualified external institution or review body and receive written EMU authorization before being used for academic credit.
The Work Must Matter Beyond The Classroom.
Every substantial culminating project must demonstrate a credible pathway from scholarship to service. “Impact” does not mean that the researcher must prove a preferred outcome. It means the project addresses a meaningful problem or opportunity, uses appropriate evidence, and produces knowledge or a deliverable that can responsibly benefit a community, profession, ministry, organization, field, or public conversation.
Identify the social, organizational, educational, ministry, technological, health, cultural, economic, or theological problem or knowledge gap.
Identify communities, stakeholders, institutions, practitioners, or populations who may use or be affected by the work.
Use credible literature, appropriate methods, transparent limitations, and sources suited to the discipline and claim.
Explain how Christian worldview informs ethics, service, stewardship, dignity, justice, leadership, or vocation without forcing the evidence to support a theological preference.
Produce a finding, framework, curriculum, tool, book, article, policy, program, technology, model, resource, or recommendation that others can understand and use.
State how the work will move beyond submission: publication, implementation, presentation, community education, open resource, organizational adoption, or another responsible channel.
Researchers may not change data, omit inconvenient findings, pressure participants, or write conclusions to make a project appear more “faithful,” more successful, or more impactful. Honest negative, null, mixed, or unexpected findings can be socially valuable and must be reported accurately.
Culminating work should include: the problem addressed; intended beneficiaries or users; faith and ethical rationale; tangible contribution; dissemination or implementation plan; limitations and foreseeable risks; and a realistic next step for continued impact after degree completion.
Publication Begins Before The Writing Is Finished.
A manuscript can create ethical, legal, privacy, authorship, copyright, and research-review obligations. Students and faculty should decide early whether work may be published so the project is designed for responsible dissemination from the beginning.
Book, journal, conference, repository, media, professional publication, or public website. Review its ethics and author requirements early.
Human-participant work may require independent ethics/IRB review before data collection. Editors may request documentation later.
Secure permission for identifiable stories, images, recordings, copyrighted figures, long quotations, proprietary tools, and organizational materials.
Credit genuine authors and contributors. Do not use gift authorship, ghost authorship, or add names solely for status.
Verify citations, data, quotations, conflicts, AI disclosures, permissions, methods, limitations, and alignment between evidence and conclusions.
Keep the final manuscript, submission record, approvals, disclosures, data documentation, and final citation or DOI if published.
Books, Memoirs, Testimonies & Case Narratives
- Your own story may still reveal private information about other identifiable people.
- Pseudonyms do not guarantee anonymity if details make a person recognizable.
- Get written permission for identifiable participant stories, photographs, recordings, or sensitive quotations where appropriate.
- Do not turn pastoral, counseling, student, employee, or ministry confidences into publishable case material without ethical and privacy review.
- Distinguish personal testimony, theological interpretation, professional opinion, and empirical evidence.
Journal Articles & Conference Papers
- Follow the target journal or conference ethics, authorship, conflict-of-interest, data, and AI policies.
- If human-participant ethics approval may be required, resolve that before recruitment or data collection—not at manuscript submission.
- Report methods and limitations honestly and do not selectively omit results simply because they weaken the preferred argument.
- Do not submit the same manuscript to multiple journals simultaneously unless the venues explicitly allow it.
Faith-Based & Theological Publications
- Scripture, theology, doctrine, and ministry reflection are welcomed as legitimate scholarly dimensions of EMU work.
- Do not represent theological conviction as empirical proof when the research question requires empirical evidence.
- Use accurate biblical citation, responsible interpretation, and appropriate scholarly sources for historical or academic claims.
- Do not manipulate participant responses to make a faith-based intervention appear effective.
Avoid Predatory Publishing
- Verify the journal’s ownership, editorial board, peer-review process, fees, contact information, and publication history.
- Be cautious of guaranteed acceptance, unrealistically fast peer review, aggressive solicitation, fake impact metrics, or unclear fees.
- Check whether claimed indexing can be independently verified.
- Faculty should approve the proposed outlet when publication is part of a culminating requirement.
Students and employees may identify an accurate EMU affiliation when appropriate to the work. Publication under an EMU affiliation does not mean that the University endorses every conclusion. Authors remain responsible for the accuracy, ethics, originality, permissions, and claims in their work.
A Credible Research Record Must Be Traceable.
Research integrity applies from the first note through the final publication. Keep enough documentation to show where evidence came from, how decisions were made, what changed, who contributed, and whether the published claims match the underlying record.
Fabrication, Falsification & Plagiarism
EMU treats fabrication, falsification, and plagiarism as serious research-integrity violations.
- Never invent participants, interviews, quotations, sources, data, references, approvals, or results.
- Never alter or omit data to misrepresent what occurred.
- Credit ideas, wording, methods, figures, data, and intellectual contributions appropriately.
Data Protection
- Collect the minimum data necessary to answer the question.
- Use coded or de-identified data when possible.
- Separate identity keys from analytic data.
- Use institutionally authorized secure storage for sensitive information.
- EMU default retention for project records is three years after closeout unless a stricter law, sponsor, publisher, or disciplinary standard applies.
Responsible AI
- Humans remain responsible for accuracy, originality, attribution, analysis, and final conclusions.
- Never rely on AI-generated citations without independently verifying the source.
- Do not upload confidential manuscripts, identifiable participant data, protected records, or unpublished sensitive datasets into unauthorized AI systems.
- Disclose substantive AI use when required by EMU, an instructor, a publisher, or the publication venue.
Authorship & Contribution
- Authorship should reflect genuine intellectual contribution and accountability.
- Do not give authorship as a favor, status symbol, payment, or reward.
- A faculty mentor’s role should be credited according to actual contribution and venue rules.
- Resolve authorship expectations early in collaborative projects.
Copyright & Intellectual Property
- Permission may be needed for photographs, figures, instruments, illustrations, long quotations, proprietary curriculum, or third-party content.
- Open-access does not always mean unrestricted reuse.
- Attribute open licenses correctly and verify commercial/reuse restrictions.
- Do not reproduce copyrighted books, articles, assessment tools, or images beyond permitted use.
Changes, Incidents & Closeout
- Submit substantive method, population, instrument, recruitment, consent, or data-use changes before implementing them.
- Report serious participant-safety, privacy, or confidentiality incidents immediately and no later than 24 hours after discovery.
- Report other material deviations promptly.
- At closeout, confirm data disposition, unresolved concerns, and intended publication or dissemination.
EMU encourages faith-integrated inquiry, but researchers may not suppress contrary evidence, convert ministry authority into participant pressure, label ordinary disagreement as spiritual failure, or substitute conviction for methods that the research question requires.
One Packet. One Written Pathway.
Students should work with the faculty member, chair, or project supervisor first. Once the academic design is ready, send one complete packet for research-ethics classification. Incomplete submissions pause the review clock because missing consent language, instruments, data plans, or organizational permissions can materially change the risk assessment.
Minimum Submission Packet
Question, purpose, design, population/data, setting, timeline.
Societal need, users/beneficiaries, faith lens, deliverable, dissemination.
Advisor/chair confirmation that the design is academically ready for ethics screening.
Survey, interview guide, focus-group guide, observation protocol, intervention, scripts, prompts.
Emails, flyers, social posts, announcements, scripts, invitations.
Participant consent, image/recording permission, parent/guardian materials when applicable.
Collection, identifiers, storage, access, retention, deletion, AI/tool use.
Partner permission, local approval, external IRB/ethics determination, sponsor requirements when applicable.
If you may turn the project into a journal article, book, conference paper, public report, website, documentary, podcast, or other public work, state that before data collection.
Review Sequence & Records
- Administrative completeness check. The packet is checked for required materials.
- Project classification. EMU identifies the internal pathway and whether external review or permission is required.
- Ethics and integrity review. Risk, consent, privacy, methods, power dynamics, faith-based practices, publication intent, and data handling are evaluated.
- Written determination. The researcher receives a documented pathway: recorded scholarly/no-human project, EMU ethics clearance, external review required, revision required, or not permitted as designed.
- Conduct and amendment control. Material changes are submitted before implementation.
- Closeout and publication readiness. Final data disposition, incidents, impact plan, authorship, permissions, disclosure, and dissemination are documented.
| Project Status | May Data Collection Begin? | What It Means |
|---|---|---|
| Draft / Faculty Review | No | Academic design is still being developed. |
| RESI Screening Pending | No | Institutional classification has not yet been issued. |
| External Review Required | No | Obtain and document the required outside determination/approval first. |
| EMU Ethics Clearance Issued | Yes, within cleared scope | Proceed exactly as documented unless another requirement applies. |
| Amendment Pending | Original scope only | Do not implement the proposed change until cleared. |
| Closed | No new collection | Move to analysis, archiving, impact, and publication obligations. |
Research Ethics & Scholarly Integrity Support
Submit complete packets and research-ethics questions to ethicsreview@ebedmelech.ac. Use subject line: RESI Submission — [Student/Researcher Name] — [Project Title]. No individual chair or staff member is required for the process to remain valid; institutional records and determinations are issued through the University.
Institutional Disclaimer
Ebed-Melech University’s RESI process is an internal academic, ethics, risk, and scholarly-integrity process. It does not claim federal IRB registration, an OHRP Federalwide Assurance, FDA authority, or recognition as a substitute for an external IRB, ethics committee, sponsor, partner institution, regulator, publisher, or jurisdiction when one of those bodies requires review.
Researchers remain responsible for complying with applicable law, professional obligations, contractual requirements, funding requirements, publisher policies, and local or international requirements. EMU may require safeguards that are stricter than the minimum legal requirement when necessary to protect people, preserve institutional integrity, or ensure that culminating work is suitable for academic credit.