Wartburg College promotes and actively supports the ethical treatment of animals.  As such, all learning activities associated with Wartburg College that involve the use of non-human vertebrate animals must first be submitted to the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) for their review and approval.  The IACUC has no official oversight role for activities that involve invertebrate animals.  However, members of the Wartburg community who are planning on using invertebrates are welcome to use the committee as a sounding board to help discuss ethical considerations.  (Note:  The activities over which the IACUC has purview have increased compared to HARRC.  Please use these new guidelines when deciding whether or not your activity requires approval by the IACUC.)

Examples of activities that would require IACUC approval:

• Housing of vertebrates in the animal facility, classrooms, or public spaces
• Lab or field research involving physical interaction with vertebrates
• Course activities involving interaction with vertebrates
• Exhibiting of vertebrates off-campus while representing the college

Examples of situations that are exempt from IACUC oversight:

• Any of the above that would involve only invertebrates
• Personal pets or service animals
• Purely observational experiments of wild animals