Quality assurance project and sampling and analysis plans
Organizations wishing to participate in the Volunteer Monitoring Program must complete a plan which documents why they are doing the monitoring, how the data will be used, what methods will be used and how the data will be reported. General procedures are outlined in the Water Quality Volunteer Monitoring QAPP. Groups should review this QAPP to make sure they understand and agree to the general procedures that pertain to volunteer groups. Organizations then must complete their own Sampling and Analysis Plan which describes aspects of the monitoring that are specific to their project. Completed SAP's are submitted to the DEQ Volunteer Monitoring Specialist for review and approval by the ODEQ Quality Assurance Officer. The Volunteer Monitoring Specialist is available to meet with your group to help work through the details of these plans.
Equipment and protocols
Data management and data submission to DEQ
Volunteer monitoring groups submit continuous temperature and grab water quality data to the Volunteer Monitoring Specialist. Data providers are asked to assign data quality levels to all results submitted to the DEQ; however, all electronic quality control information should be submitted with field results to assist with DEQ's data review. Field data quality levels are assigned based on criteria from the Data Quality Matrix.
Continuous water quality data
Continuous data submissions to the Volunteer Monitoring Specialist should be made following the template Continuous Data Submittal format. See the help documentation for more information on completing the template.
ThePrePostExtractor spreadsheet may be used to speed up accuracy check data for continuous temperature.
Grab water quality data
The Evaluating Your Data for Data Quality presentation provides information on assigning data quality levels to grab water quality data.
Grab Water Quality data should be submitted to the Volunteer Monitoring Specialist in theVolWQGrabData Submittal format. Descriptions of the required data elements for this format can be found within the workbook or in the grab data submittal help file.
Benthic macroinvertebrate data
The taxonomic results should be submitted to the Volunteer Monitoring Specialist in theVolWQMacroInvert Data Submission. Contact the Volunteer Monitoring Specialist for the most up to date taxonomic tables.
Find volunteer water quality data
Data generated by organizations using DEQ Volunteer Monitoring Program equipment are public information. Partner organizations submit data to the DEQ.
Prior to 2013, data was reviewed and uploaded to the DEQ’s LASAR database. These data processed at the DEQ prior to 2013 can be accessed from the Laboratory Analytical Storage and Retrieval Database LASAR. View the 2011-2012 status report of volunteer data to view what data was submitted prior to 2013 and whether the data was reviewed, processed and uploaded into LASAR
Any data that were not submitted or reviewed prior to 2013 are only available by data request at this time. To find what data has been submitted please refer to this periodic list of submitted volunteer partner data not in LASAR or contact the volunteer monitoring coordinator.
Data analysis and presentation workshop
The following presentations were part of a presentation co-facilitated by Steve Hanson, DEQ Volunteer Monitoring Specialist, and Beth Lambert, Watershed Management Educator, OSU Extension Service, Tillamook. Download the following presentations:
Contact
For additional information please contact Nick Haxton, Volunteer Monitoring Specialist at 503-693-5731.