Supporting the advancement of FDA's integrated food safety system (ifss) training delivery and development - RFA-FD-25-016

The Food and Drug Administration awarded the International Food Protection Training Institute (IFPTI), doing business as Global Food Protection Institute, a $500,000 cooperative agreement on September 22, 2025, to support the advancement of the FDA's Integrated Food Safety System (IFSS) training delivery and development under the Food and Drug Administration Research program (CFDA 93.103).

IFPTI will deliver three primary aims: course planning activities including collaboration with FDA's Office of Training and Education Development (OTED) on process improvement, subject matter expert recruitment and coordination, instructor skills training delivery (course CC100W), instructor performance evaluation, and maintenance of instructor records; course design and development activities encompassing course development planning and oversight with OTED, course enhancement implementation, classroom and web-based content piloting in both in-person and virtual modalities, and research into emerging learning technologies; and program evaluation activities. Work is performed in Portage, Michigan, with a period of performance through August 31, 2030. IFPTI brings three consecutive prior cooperative agreements with FDA and established leadership in designing the Human and Animal Food National Curriculum Standard to this engagement.

Abstract

The international food protection training institute (ifpti) proposes to support the advancement of FDA's integrated food safety system (ifss) training delivery and development. Given its longstanding history of collaboration with FDA (through three consecutive cooperative agreements) and its leadership role in designing and developing the human and animal food (HAF) national curriculum standard (NCS), ifpti is uniquely positioned to carry out the objectives of this proposed project. The proposed project has three primary aims, all of which comprise a series of sub-aims addressed in the research strategy. A further breakdown of all of the major activities and year 1 action items associated with all sub-aims can be seen in the ifpti project activity chart appearing at the end of the research strategy and included as an attachment (appendix) to the workspace. Aim #1 focuses on course planning and will involve a series of activities designed to enhance the overall course planning processes. Activities will include collaborating with oted on process improvement strategies, identifying and recruiting appropriate subject matter experts to serve as potential course instructors, delivering the instructor skills training (IST) course (CC100W), evaluating instructor performance, and maintaining a comprehensive database of instructor-related records. Aim #2 focuses on course design and development and will primarily involve collaborating with oted on a variety of activities, including course development planning meetings, course development oversight, developing and implementing course enhancements, reviewing and piloting classroom (in-person and virtual) course content, reviewing and piloting web-based course content, and researching new technologies and modalities for learning. Aim #3 focuses on evaluation and will involve activities that leverage the recently completed HAF NCS, the career-spanning competency standard for human and animal food regulatory professionals. Leveraging the NCS will involve collaborating with oted on the creation of a comprehensive FDA training resource catalog in alignment with the NCS, utilizing NCS blueprints to either revise/update FDA training in alignment with the NCS, or develop new FDA training in alignment with the NCS. Finally, ifpti proposes to develop a new NCS but for a non-food area regulated by FDA e.g., medical products.