Help for Navigating the Research Compliance Landscape
Welcome to the Stanford Research Compliance Project website. The project launched in the summer of 2023 following a Stanford-wide assessment of the policies, procedures, and systems that researchers rely on to meet regulatory requirements. Here, we provide the latest updates about the multi-year project, research compliance news, timelines for execution, and background on the project’s history.
Stanford’s tradition of innovation and scholarly discovery is rooted in upholding the values of openness, international engagement, and collaboration with external partners. Many Stanford research policies are designed to protect these values. But we know that the research regulatory landscape is complex and ever changing. The federal government has increased its focus on issues related to improper foreign influence over research, conflicts of interest, and theft of technology and intellectual property. The result has been more robust guidelines and the introduction of new rules. The VPDoR-led Research Compliance Project is aimed at making it easier for faculty and other researchers to understand, and meet these evolving compliance obligations, while enhancing staff capacity and knowledge throughout school and administrative units.
Keeping the Focus on Processes, People, and Culture
The far-reaching examination that informs the compliance project brought together leadership from Stanford’s schools departments and an array of research support offices. The assessment included in-depth interviews and a faculty survey seeking feedback and ideas for improvements. The result is a multi-pronged initiative that focuses on five key areas related to processes, people and culture. Currently, 10 working groups are shepherding these initiatives together with a steering group led by senior associate deans from four schools.
The project takes a holistic approach to research compliance through the lens of these four areas:
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Processes: Streamline processes throughout the sponsored research lifecycle to ensure university offices and schools can efficiently assist researchers in meeting evolving regulatory requirements, and provide improved support in the areas of pre-award disclosures and conflict of interest and commitment procedures.
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Training: Enhance training opportunities for current and new staff to ensure they are well positioned to support researchers and are up to date on the latest compliance policies and regulations.
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Systems: Update Stanford’s Outside Professional Activities Certification System (OPACS) to make it more user-friendly and better integrated with other university IT systems.
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Culture: Strengthen Stanford’s culture of transparency and communications to foster greater clarity of compliance-related policies and practices among faculty, staff, and researchers.
The initiatives build on the progress made in recent years to bolster Stanford compliance policies, and procedures, and help faculty comply with the changing regulatory requirements while fostering a culture of academic freedom in research and scholarship.
Project Leadership
Linda Coleman is the Associate Vice Provost for Research Policy & Integrity at Stanford University, where she oversees the following teams: Research Security, Export Controls, and Global Engagement Review; Conflict of Interest and Conflict of Commitment; Data Governance & Privacy; and Responsible and Ethical Conduct of Research. Linda is leading this project, drawing on her extensive experience in research governance and oversight, policy development and implementation, compliance, strategic planning, and operations. Her approach to initiatives like this focuses on balancing efficiency and risk-based decision-making, ensuring that policies and processes support research while maintaining the highest ethical and regulatory standards.
Before joining Stanford, Linda was the Director of the Human Research Protection Program at Yale University, where she led strategic, operational, and compliance efforts to support ethical and regulatory oversight of human research. She also oversaw Yale’s IRB, RDRC, RIDC, ESCRO, and Institutional COI committees and served on university committees focused on areas such as investigator COI, IBC Human Gene Transfer, data privacy and governance, clinical and translational research oversight, and data safety monitoring. Prior to Yale, Linda held progressive leadership roles, including Vice President of Legal & Regulatory Affairs and Director of Regulatory Affairs & General Counsel at Quorum Review/Kinetiq (now part of Advarra), an independent IRB and consulting firm. Earlier in her career, she was an attorney at Bennett, Bigelow & Leedom, specializing in health law, employment law, and other specialty areas.
Project Updates
Read the latest Research Compliance Project developments:
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May 2025 - Systems: Stanford Report article highlights improvements to Stanford's OPACS platform, led by the Research Compliance Project team. Three simplification projects target research support
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May 2025 - Training: Stanford has developed a comprehensive Research Security Training to comply with the latest Department of Energy (DOE) requirements. Read details about how Stanford is promoting research security awareness and preparing our research community to meet current and future federal requirements. Research Security Training
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December 2024 - Systems: Required annual disclosures of outside professional activities by faculty are now being conducted on a rolling 12-month cycle. Read details about the transition from the previous static cycle, the timeline for disclosures, and how to complete the process in OPACS. Changes to Annual Disclosures of Outside Professional Activities
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October 2024 - Training: The Cardinal Research Administration Foundational Training is Stanford's comprehensive research administration training program for staff. Find out more about CRAFT and how to sign up for its training course offerings. Cardinal Research Administration Foundational Training (CRAFT) Program launched