About This Course

This course is designed to allow flexible learning for people who are engaged in the water quality sector. It will be especially useful to people involved in the collection of field samples and in the laboratory analysis of samples, but it is suitable for anyone with some scientific background or practical experience of working with water samples. It highlights the need for quality assurance programmes and illustrates how to develop one for a water quality monitoring programme. Quality assurance provides confidence that monitoring data are reliable and comparable between monitoring stations, laboratories and different monitoring programmes. This course explains the quality assurance processes and options available, from sample collection in the field through to eventual data submission to a database. Examples of internal and external laboratory quality control for water samples are presented, and the role and benefits of laboratory accreditation are outlined.