1.0 Goals and Objectives: Overview

Overview    Introduction    Status & Trend Basic Questions    Mechanisms Basic Questions

In this first step of the monitoring wheel you will gather information that will help you clearly identify the goals and objectives of your monitoring program.  Goals are generic statements that broadly define what your monitoring project hopes to achieve.  Objectives are specific quantitative statements on how the goals will be achieved.  This information will also be useful in helping you decide in step 2 what specific monitoring designs are most appropriate.  We divide the process of developing your goals and objectives into two distinct paths.  You will follow one path if your primary need is for status and trend information (e.g. what is the abundance of salmon at a point in time or is the population changing in abundance over time).  You will follow another path if you are more interested in understand the causal mechanisms responsible for the observed status and trend.  To assist you in gathering this information, we provide you with a questionaire that insures that you have considered all the important components that are needed to develop a monitoring program that meets the information needs of your program.

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