This guidance provides the steps to use Hōkai for an Animal Ethics application.

For more details about the Animal Ethics process, including procedural guidelines, information to include in the application, modifications, and final reporting, see the Animal Ethics Committee Guidance Document.

A. Create a new application

1. Click the + Apply now button under Rounds:

Rounds box with "Apply now" buttons for Human Research and Animal Research

2. Create an application title

This creates a hyperlink application reference. Use any reference text that makes sense to you, but do include the species you will be working with:

Name application window with text entered into the title box, including species

If you need to edit this reference link before you submit the application, see Manage your Applications.

You will add the actual Title of your Research Project on the application form in Q3.

3. Choose an accurate Proposed Start Date

Make sure you choose a Proposed Start Date that is after the Committee meeting deadline. The system uses the date you enter here to calculate the end date of your project, so this date should be as accurate as possible:

Proposed Start Date field with a date entered

For interim approval before the next meeting, allow for 21 days for application processing before the start date.

4. Prepare a straightforward lay summary

The lay summary should be a short paragraph for non-scientists that describes the general aims of the project. It is critical for making sure the lay member of the AEC understands the project, and it also ensures your research can be described to wider audiences in a concise way.

The AEC will return an application with a poorly worded lay summary for revision.

This one page Guide from the University of Exeter offers practical advice for writing a lay summary: Writing_a_Lay_Summary.pdf

5. Fill in the form

Fill in the form in the order of the questions, because earlier questions activate other dynamic sections to appear, such as Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs). The form will automatically save when you click Next at the bottom, or a section link on the left:

Application screen with the "Next" button and section buttons highlighted

Most questions are required. When you skip a required question, instructions appear in red:

AE Question with a red box and text appearing that it is required

A word counter in the bottom right of each text box shows the word limit remaining; note these limits are much higher than they were in ResearchMaster:

Question box partially filled in, with "959 words remaining" in lower right highlighted

While the form consists of the same questions that appeared in ResearchMaster, there are a few changes on the Hōkai form:

Funding information is now listed as Q11
New section created called "Additional considerations": IDAO requirement and/or DOC permit questions appear in this section
New question added: Q18 collects information used in reporting animal use statistics to MPI

B. Add yourself and your project team

In the Project Team section of the form, you add the people involved in the application and their role, including yourself.

Any member of the research team can create the application. Only the Principal Investigator can submit it.

Make sure to include every person required. There are several options for researcher roles:

Role of Researcher Options

Principal Investigator

Associate Investigator

PhD student

Postdoctoral Fellow

Research Assistant

Masters Student

Honours Student

Research Student

Other Researcher

Lab Manager

Research Associate

Technical Assistant

Veterinarian

For teaching programs: add the staff who will be supervising students and overseeing animal welfare in the course.
For project taking place in an animal vivarium: add the Facility Manager (use the Lab Manager role). This is important for post approval monitoring and following PREPARE guidelines.

Every person involved in the manipulation of an animal as part of the research program must be listed on the application.

Add yourself
- Search contact: Search for your name and/or email address and select
- The system automatically recognises you as the Owner of the application you create
- Role of Researcher: Select your role
- Click on Confirm contact

Add your team
- Note you can add people in any order.
- Search contact and select their role.
- No reply email address: If you see the email address noreply@vuw.ac.nz for a researcher, contact system admins so this can be updated: hokai@vuw.ac.nz
- No contact in the system (new/external): Any student or external researcher who does not have an account in Hōkai can be added, by having them complete a Hōkai Access Form. You can list them on the application with their preferred address - they will not be able to access the application until their account is set up.
- Click on Confirm contact

Important: Make sure you click Confirm contact for every researcher who needs to view the application.

When this button changes to "Contact confirmed", important actions happen:

- It confirms their access to the application. If you do not confirm them, the application will not appear for them in Hōkai.
- The system sends them an email notification that they have been added to the application.

This button will turn green and change to Contact confirmed when you click it, as shown in this gif:

GIF of selecting a contact and clicking "Confirm contact" changes it to "contact confirmed"

C. Change access rights or add more reviewers

Access Rights for each Researcher appear when the Contact is confirmed:

Owner - Edit rights automatically granted to the person who created the application
Edit - Able to edit the application; granted by default to a Principal Investigator, Masters student, or Honours student
View - View only access; granted by default to all other Roles.

1. You can change the Access Rights any time. Click on the Invite user to register or share application button in the top right of the screen:

Project Team page with Invite user to register or share button highlighted and arrow pointing down to the next image

Invite user window showing Modify Access options

2. You will see each Project Team member you added, with their Access Status as "Shared with view access" or "Shared with edit access". You can change this for any person.

3. You can also invite others who are not part of the project team to access the application, such as a peer reviewer, funding advisor, etc.

- Add their email address and select the Access type. When you click Save and send, it will send them an email notification.
- If the person is not registered with a Hōkai account, they will need to register by completing a Hōkai Access Request form.

Invited access window showing user is found and Save and send button

D. Download a draft application

The Preview button always appears in the top right corner of the application.

$LaTeX: \rightarrow$ Click the Preview button to download your draft application:

Application screen with Preview button highlighted

This downloads a zip file with a Word and PDF version of the draft, as well as any supporting documents.

E. Prepare and upload supporting documents

Documents to include

You may need to attach key project documents to the application. This could include:

A more detailed experimental design with pictures and tables
Standard Operating Procedures: e.g. DOCDM-708212
Tables of animal use
Diagrams of experiment progression with stop/proceed decision points
Additional information on staff experience or previous experiments

Select the appropriate Type for each document you upload:

Documents section with dropdown options for type, e.g. IDAO form, tables of animal use, etc.

File formats and size

You can upload any document or image file format, e.g. Word document, PDF, Plain text, JPG, etc.
Each attachment is limited to 10mb in size, and the cumulative size for all attachments must not exceed 95mb.
- If your document is too big, try resizing or compressing any images inside the document. In Word, click on the image and go the 'Picture Format' tab, then select 'Compress Pictures'.

F. Submit the application

The Principal Investigator submits the application when it is complete. The Accept and Submit button only appears for the Principal Investigator:

Sign Off page with Accept and Submit button

When the application is submitted, every researcher confirmed on the application will receive an email confirmation. It will also appear on their Applications page with the status Submitted. See Manage your Applications for more about the Applications page.