Full course description
An EPA-approved Quality Assurance Project Plan (QAPP) is required to implement EPA-funded work that involves acquisition of environmental data from direct measurement activities, collected from other sources, or compiled from computerized databases and information systems. Data gathering projects, including those that are self-funded, require a QAPP to ensure the project is designed and documented to provide legally-defensible data.
How to use this course:
You will see different sections below for different parameters, refer to the section appropriate for your QAPP. (If you are writing a QAPP for a pollutant not included in this course, the available information here can still be helpful. Contact the instructors with questions.)
We provide a “QAPP Shell" document (in the Resources section) with the 24 elements, page headers, and a table of contents. You may download the shell and type your own text into each element; if you have an old QAPP that you are editing, you can refer to the resource material in this course to help you.
Use the resources that are relevant to you and bypass those that are not applicable. Contact us with questions about how the material relates to your QAPP.
If you'd like for the instructors to review sections of your QAPP or the entire document, you may upload the file in the "Submit your QAPP (portions or completed version) for review" page (last section before the Certificate below).
NOTE: If your project is US EPA-funded, your regional office may have specific guidance. This course is for everyone and strictly adheres to US EPA and American National Standards Institute (ANSI) guidance, but does not take into account specific requirements from different EPA regions. Each EPA region has a QA resources page and it is important you consult that page and your regional contacts.
Instructors:
Melinda Ronca-Battista, Melinda.Ronca-Battista@nau.edu, 602-616-2218
Chris Lee, Christopher.Lee@nau.edu, 702-784-8264