Stakeholder Engagement Program

Jump to White Papers & Quick Guides

One of the key goals of the OPERA project is to engage with interested satellite data users and members of the broader science and applications community, most notably our primary stakeholders in the federal agencies that require the OPERA products. Within our primary stakeholders, two sub-groups can be distinguished:

• Managers at a federal agency whose responsibilities include ensuring that the information contained in the OPERA products meets the needs of the agency
• Users at a federal agency who can directly utilize the OPERA products for applications within their agency

Our Stakeholder Engagement Program (SEP) recognizes that different levels and types of engagement are needed for each of these two main stakeholder groups, and will be proposing engagement activities accordingly. In addition to this core group of stakeholders, a broader scope of activities will engage the more diverse community of OPERA product users.

The SNWG Cycle-2 federal agencies with identified needs for the three main OPERA data products – DSWx, DIST, and DISP – are within the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), Department of Interior (DOI), and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) For these primary stakeholders, the OPERA SEP has reached out to all the agencies through email to form a list of contacts. A group of designated users for each product has also been identified at the product information workshops to facilitate the dialogue and provide feedback. These groups are designed to be inclusive and are be led by the stakeholders at the agencies who will be using OPERA products routinely once they are released.

OPERA will also pursue opportunities to engage other potential participants within the wider user community. We anticipate that specific partners from the broader community will come from three areas of the community:

• Other Federal Agencies: Federal agency users outside the SNWG Cycle-2 federal agencies listed above. Depending on their specific needs, these agencies could be engaged via the same activities envisioned for the primary stakeholders
• Science Users: Researchers working to improve algorithms or create derivative products from the OPERA products
• Application Users: Researchers or practitioners making use of the OPERA products to meet a specific need

Broader community participants will be selected focusing on diversity of represented applications and people.

• Product Quick Guides: Two-page, summary-level product quick guides created for each of the OPERA products to provide a short overview of the product, a description of how it is created, an outline of potential application areas, and discuss strengths and limitations when using the product. The product quick guides will be hosted at the bottom of this page and disseminated to the broader stakeholder community in hard-copy form as opportunities arise (e.g. at professional conferences).
• White Papers: Potential uses of OPERA data products will be demonstrated via white papers, aiming to describe examples of OPERA products' utility in a specific application. For example, this includes white papers focusing on the monitoring and hazards applications of DSWx, DIST, and DISP products. These white papers will also be available through links at the bottom of this page.
• Workshops: Workshops will be held for OPERA stakeholders approximately every nine months, reflecting the staggered timeline for the release of the data. These workshops will provide external partners and community members with updates on the overall project status, as well as detailed information about OPERA products, generally covering the following topics:
  • OPERA programmatic updates (all workshops)
  • Interaction with users to identify any changes in the needs and associated applications
  • Detailed updates on algorithm development and briefings on calibration and validation approaches
  • Data access through the NASA Distributed Active Archive Center (DAAC) – presentations facilitated by the DAACs
  • Interactive white paper demonstration, explanation of metadata, strengths, and limitations, etc.
  • Invited talks by OPERA stakeholders on their applications, cal/val findings
  • Conference-style oral and poster presentations from stakeholders and community members

The OPERA workshops have a hybrid (virtual and in-person) participation format. For in-person workshops, travel grants will be offered to select participants within the federal statute and regulations in order to improve participation from diverse communities. The workshop activities will be recorded and made available through this page to reach a larger audience.