Progress 09/15/00 to 09/14/05
Outputs
Volunteer water quality monitoring programs often serve as the critical first link that engages the public in watershed stewardship. They improve the understanding of local water resources, encourage individual and community involvement in water quality protection and restoration efforts and help communities make informed decisions that improve water quality. This national facilitation project was undertaken to create a network and build a comprehensive support system for Extension volunteer water quality monitoring efforts thus increasing their recognition, value and viability. Shared by Rhode Island and Wisconsin Extension, this project produced significant outputs and outcomes. The most visible output is our flagship website www.usawaterquality.org/volunteer. It is a primary networking and communication tool for this project. The website houses all resources for this project, including presentations and factsheets, making these products easily available. During the
project we located 38 Extension-based or associated volunteer monitoring programs, all of which are listed and linked, with select individual programs highlighted with more extensive information. Before this project the vast majority of these programs had little or no knowledge of each other and often underplayed their Extension connection. We extensively queried program and State coordinators and summarized findings on their program strengths, weaknesses, successes, and challenges and perceptions of volunteer monitoring on the website. We established a mechanism of direct communication among programs via our project listserv, CSREESVolMon@lists.uwex.edu. Its membership is open to all, and now has more than 340 members, nearly as many as the venerable EPA volunteer monitoring listserv. Our website topically archives responses to queries to either listserv, which is not done elsewhere and is a popular output. Currently 18 topics are archived. We researched, developed, and produced a
number of factsheet modules for the Guide for Growing CSREES Volunteer Monitoring Programs, available both in print and on the website. These in-depth factsheets range from 4 to 14 pages and feature numerous links, supplementing each topic. This approaches one-stop shopping for program coordinators, within and outside of Extension, who are interested in starting, expanding or re-evaluating their programs. We developed and expanded a Wisconsin on-line volunteer monitoring database and produced a guide to aid others interested in developing their own, with links to other programs on-line databases. At the invitation of regional and state Extension Water quality coordinators, we developed curricula and conducted volunteer monitoring workshops tailored to the particular needs of host regions and states. We conducted volunteer monitoring workshops at annual national CSREES Water Quality conferences. Post-workshop evaluations were uniformly positive. Extension-sponsored volunteer monitoring
strengthens the capacity of Cooperative Extension to deliver timely programs at many levels. We urge continued CSREES support of volunteer monitoring as a means to meet community, state and regional water quality goals.
Impacts
This project produced notable outcomes and impacts that have strengthened Extension volunteer monitoring programs throughout the country. Extension has gained widespread recognition and assumed a leadership role as a national service provider for volunteer water quality monitoring. This has led to strengthened strategic partnerships within the Extension system and between Extension and other agencies, and enhanced recognition of Extension volunteer monitoring efforts as a viable component of the water monitoring community. There is increased recognition of, and improved communication and collaboration among Extension programs. The creation and easy availability of resources has reduced the effort needed to start a new program or expand an existing one. Strengthened and newly developed volunteer monitoring-related research and extension efforts among Extension and partner volunteer monitoring programs have led to enhanced credibility and improved support for all
programs. With four years of additional funding awarded in 2004, research, education and outreach efforts, strategic partnerships, and collaborative efforts are expected to multiply, building upon the successes of this current project.
Publications
- Volunteer Water Quality Monitoring. 2001. Project Factsheet I. www.usawaterquality.org/volunteer/GuideforGrowing/index.html
- Why Volunteer Water Quality Monitoring Makes Sense. 2002. Project Factsheet II.www.usawaterquality.org/volunteer/GuideforGrowing/index.html
- Getting Started: Finding Resources in the Guide for Growing CSREES Volunteer Monitoring Programs. 2003. Project Factsheet III. www.usawaterquality.org/volunteer/GuideforGrowing/index.html
- Designing Your Monitoring Strategy: Basic Questions and Resources to Help Guide You. 2003. Project Factsheet IV. www.usawaterquality.org/volunteer/GuideforGrowing/index.html
- Training Volunteer Water Quality Monitors Effectively. 2004 Project Factsheet V. www.usawaterquality.org/volunteer/GuideforGrowing/index.html
- Building Credibility: Quality Assurance and Quality Control for Volunteer Monitoring Programs. 2004. Project Factsheet VI. www.usawaterquality.org/volunteer/GuideforGrowing/index.html
- Herron, Elizabeth and Kristine Stepenuck. 2003. Cooperative Extension- Volunteer Monitoring Partnerships. The Volunteer Monitor newsletter. Winter 2003, p.18-20. http://www.epa.gov/owow/monitoring/volunteer/newsletter/volmon15no1.p df
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Progress 10/01/03 to 09/30/04
Outputs
This national facilitation project has been undertaken as a means of building a comprehensive support system for CSREES/Extension volunteer water quality monitoring efforts. This nationwide initiative is shared by Rhode Island and Wisconsin Extension. In this fourth year of our project we have hit our stride with program delivery and capacity building for volunteer monitoring efforts. We were invited to, and conducted volunteer monitoring workshops at Southern and Pacific Northwest Region meetings, and at statewide Extension meetings in Arizona, Florida, and New Jersey. We made additional presentations at more than a dozen national conferences. We have posted almost all of the presentations on our flagship website www.usawaterquality.org/volunteer. The twelve-page factsheet Training Water Quality Monitors Effectively was added to the previous ones in our Guide For Growing CSREES Volunteer Monitoring Programs. Besides its comprehensiveness, this newest factsheet also
has a substantial number of electronic links to other resources which enhances its utility. On the website we have also created direct links to other volunteer monitoring program monitoring manuals. We have added a Jobs Posting section and also a section with links to papers comparing volunteer to professional monitoring. Our list serve, csreesvolmon@lists.uwex.edu, now has over 120 members, which is almost half the size of the venerable EPA volunteer monitoring list serve. Questions are often posted to volunteer monitoring list serves which elicit a range of responses. Other than articles in the Volunteer Monitor newsletter there has been no easily accessible method to collate and archive the responses. We have created a section of our website that does just that. The ability to have a website that can be (and is) frequently updated and revised keeps it current and shows its responsiveness to emerging issues and concerns. As a part of this project we evaluated the Wisconsin Water
Action Volunteers on-line database template, the response was overwhelmingly positive. As an offshoot of the database development effort we have added direct links to other programs on-line databases on our website. Additionally, we are now preparing a factsheet on what to think about when a program is considering creating an on-line database to guide others. The sum of all these efforts is that Extension is now in a leadership role as a national service provider for volunteer water quality monitoring and enjoys strategic partnerships with other agencies. There is enhanced communication among existing programs, reduced effort needed to start a new one, improved support for and credibility of all programs, and expanded volunteer opportunities leading to increased stewardship. A much -appreciated confirmation of our impact was our successful application for an additional four years of funding.
Impacts
The expected impacts of this project are 1) enhanced communication among existing CSREES/Extension volunteer monitoring programs nationwide, 2) a template for local data sharing and internet learning developed, 3) expanded volunteer opportunities by strengthening local and state capacity for these programs, 4) increased collaboration with, and strengthened strategic partnerships within, and between CSREES and other agencies. Our efforts will promote CSREES-based volunteer monitoring programs as an effective mechanism for addressing the goals of the Water Quality Education Program.
Publications
- No publications reported this period
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Progress 10/01/02 to 09/30/03
Outputs
This national facilitation project has been undertaken as a means of building a comprehensive support system for CSREES/Extension volunteer water quality monitoring efforts. This is third year of this new initiative shared by Rhode Island and Wisconsin Extension. The first year involved a great deal of active communication and thoughtful reflection on setting the stage for this new project and how best to get it staffed, up and running. In the second year we spent considerable effort in learning about our constituent programs through two inquiries and reflecting how to use that knowledge. We launched our list serve and website www.usawaterquaoity.org/volunteer and developed the first iteration of Wisconsin's data sharing database. In this third year we entered the mainstream of our project. The website was updated and improved on numerous occasions throughout the year. We have added a number of sections and many links. We added the text of the nationwide inquiry from
year 2 as well as summaries of each section, a section on Outreach Materials and Activities which includes all posters, PowerPoint presentations for conferences workshops and trainings, and a jobs posted section. Several more programs were highlighted and a section to archive all highlighted programs was added. Our website also contains vignettes of Extension program participation in National Water Monitoring Day. To enable us to share results of our database piloting as well as experiences of other volunteer monitoring programs with similar online databases, we developed an inquiry that will be used with program coordinators in our Extension volunteer monitoring network. The inquiry results will provide the basis for an additional guidebook chapter about online databases. Considerable progress was made in the development of modules for the Guide For Growing Extension Programs. We incorporated results from the Tier 2 program coordinator inquiry and further information learned from
Extension programs to refine the content of the Guidebook modules. The five completed Guidebook modules, in factsheet form, have all been posted to our website as downloadable pdf files with numerous links to additional programs and products in order to enhance their utility. One of the goals of this project has been to offer trainings upon request at regional and other venues. In this past year we assisted Pacific Northwest coordinators in curriculum development and delivery for a 2-day volunteer monitoring training workshop at the central Idaho 4-H camp. Elizabeth Herron and Kris Stepenuck wrote Cooperative Extension/Volunteer Monitoring Partnerships for the Winter 2003 issue (volume 15 no.1) of The Volunteer Monitor. We involved ourselves at national levels with other agency members of the water quality community by active participation in promoting celebrations of the thirtieth anniversary of the Clean Water Act and National Water Monitoring Day. We are right on track with our
project timeline and have built capacity and enjoy increased momentum as we move into the fourth year of this project.
Impacts
1) enhanced communication among existing CSREES/Extension volunteer monitoring programs nationwide, 2) template for local data sharing and internet learning developed, 3) expanded volunteer opportunities by strengthening local and state capacity for these programs, 4) increased collaboration with, and strengthened strategic partnerships within the CSREES/Extension network and between CSREES and other agencies, and 5) increased number and quality of Extension-associated volunteer monitoring programs.
Publications
- No publications reported this period
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Progress 10/01/01 to 09/30/02
Outputs
This national facilitation project has been undertaken as a means of building a comprehensive support system for CSREES/Extension volunteer water quality monitoring efforts. This is a new initiative shared by Rhode Island and Wisconsin Extension. The first year involved a great deal of active communication and thoughtful reflection on setting the stage for this new project and how best to get it staffed, up and running. In this second year we spent considerable effort in learning about our constituent programs through two inquiries and reflecting how to use that knowledge. We launched our listserve and website in order to enhance communication and outreach efforts within and outside of the Extension volunteer monitoring community, and to share what we are learning. The Wisconsin volunteer water quality monitoring web-based database (http://clean-water.uwex.edu/wav/datagate.htm) progressed from a template to Web-based database. We involved ourselves at national levels
with other components of the water quality community as active member of the National Work group for the October 18, 2002 celebration of the thirtieth anniversary of Clean Water Act and the inaugural National Water Monitoring Day and in other venues. A several-tiered inquiry approach was used to locate and learn about volunteer monitoring programs. We have learned of 27 Extension-associated volunteer water quality monitoring programs in 24 states/territories. 17 states/territories indicated that they have no such programs. In February 2002 an 8-part inquiry was sent to all identified program coordinators. Responses have given us great insight into the wide spectrum of Extension volunteer monitoring programs and will help us tailor our outreach efforts. We created a database of programs and contacts and used it to populate an Internet list serve (CSREESvolmon-list@lists.CES.UWEX.EDU) that is housed at UW. We created and launched the CSREES volunteer monitoring website
www.usawaterquality.org/volunteer. This multi-facetted website contains contact information for all Extension volunteer water quality monitoring programs, factsheets, a section for highlighted programs, and pdf's of all outreach materials for this project and numerous links to other sites. This provides an easily accessible means to learn about other Extension programs. Considerable discussion took place during year 2 on content and presentation of the modular components of The Guide for Growing CSREES Volunteer Monitoring Program. Each module will have the same basic layout and outline (i.e. introduction, overview of topic, benefits and problems associated with various approaches with vignettes from various programs demonstrating a range of successful options regarding the topic. The initial module, Why Volunteer Water Quality Monitoring Makes Sense has been created and posted. We look forward to continue our advance into the heart of our project as we enter the third year. We look
forward to continue our advance into the heart of our project as we enter the third year.
Impacts
1) Enhanced communication among existing CSREES/Extension volunteer monitoring programs nationwide,2) template for local data sharing and internet learning developed, 3) expanded volunteer opportunities by strenghtening local and state capacity for these programs, 4) increasd collaboration with, and and strengthened strategic partnershiops within the the CSREES/Extension network and between CSREES and other agencies, and 5) increased number and quality of Extension-associated vounteer monitoriing programs.
Publications
- No publications reported this period
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Progress 10/01/00 to 09/30/01
Outputs
This national facilitation project was undertaken as a means of building a comprehensive support system for CSREES/Extension volunteer water quality monitoring efforts. This project is unique in that it does not build on any existing CSREES national program but is a new initiative. Our thrust in year one of this project focused on discovering the extent and number of existing Extension-based volunteer monitoring programs. In July 2001, we contacted via email 128 people in 55 states/territories. From responses received we developed a current CSREES volunteer monitoring/ state Extension Water Quality coordinators contact list. In September 2001, we mailed a one-page inquiry to 100 individuals identified through the email inquiry. This inquiry focused on refining the group we will be interacting with, and learning some basics regarding who, what, and where information, how Extension is associated with their program, as well as major and minor program objectives. Of the
56 states/territories that we queried, there were 73 responses from 45 states/territories, reporting 31 programs in 24 states/territories. Seventeen states/territories have no Extension-run programs. Of those 17, 4 indicated a desire to start a program, and 12 already assist with others programs. This was a slight increase since the 1996 assessment when there were 29 Extension-connected volunteer water quality monitoring programs in 19 states. We utilized these contacts to create a database of programs and contacts and to populate an Internet list serve that is housed at UW. The list serve is "CSREESvolmon-list@lists.CES.UWEX.EDU. Our inquiries do not replicate past EPA assessments, and serve our objectives of fostering emerging programs, helping grow current programs, and making Extension supportive and proud of volunteer monitoring efforts nationwide. An initial outline has been developed for the "Guide to Growing CSREES Monitoring Programs". The Guide is in a modular form, with
each module having the same basic layout and outline followed by factsheets from various programs demonstrating a range of successful options regarding the topic. The factsheets will carry the "home" program name, logo, contact information, etc., so the strength and diversity of the existing programs are apparent. The first modules will focus on providing a framework for volunteer monitoring programs, for example "Types of monitoring activities available", and "Quality assurance issues" enabling us to provide immediate assistance to new and developing programs. The volunteer water quality monitoring web-based database template has undergone a number of changes that increased both the user-friendliness, data collection, storage and querying capabilities. Sample data have been entered into the database from three different monitoring groups in Wisconsin.
Impacts
- 1)Enhanced communication among existing CSREES/Extension volunteer monitoring programs nationwide, 2) template for local data sharing and internet learning developed, 3) expanded volunteer opportunities by strengthening local and state capacity for CSREES/Extension volunteer monitoring programs, 4) increased collaboration with and strengthened strategic partnerships within CSREES/Extension network and between CSREES and other agencies, and 5) increased number and quality of Extension-associated volunteer monitoring programs.
Publications
- No publications reported this period
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