Appropriate validation methods to evaluate the performance of space environment models, forecasting techniques and procedures are critical to the
development and further improvements of operational space weather prediction capabilities.   Confidence assessment is an essential component of
space weather forecasting. The approach to the validation, uncertainty assessment and to the format of the metrics is strongly dependent on
specific applications and end user needs.There is a need to understand which aspects of spatial and temporal characteristics of space environment
parameters are the most important for specific impacts on technological and biological systems. There is a need to agree on a set of standard
metrics that can be used to assess the current state of space environment predictive capabilities and trace improvements over time. It is also
necessary to address challenges of model-data comparisons, such as observational data quality and availability, sensitivity of model outputs to
external drivers (input parameters), boundary conditions, modeling assumptions, adjustable parameters. etc.There are a number of on-going community
model validation activities (e.g., GEM-CEDAR-SHINE community-wide Modeling Challenges) that have demonstrated the value of systematic and
coordinated model validation projects. In addition the experience of Numerical Weather Prediction in developing standardized, well understood
verification tools could be invaluable in developing similar tools for space weather predictions.

 The goal of the session is to bring together modelers, observational data providers, application developers & space weather service providers in an
international framework to review the state of model and service validation activities, to build upon successes, to identify challenges, and to
develop a strategy for continuous assessment of space weather predictive capabilities and tracing the improvement over time, building on the
direction of travel.