It is with a very heavy heart that we inform you that Tricialouise Gurley, Youth MOVE National Founding Board Member, passed away this morning (August 3, 2012) in her home in Montreal, Canada. She passed from an unexpected medical emergency.

Tricia was 30 years young, was recently married to John Millard, and was transitioning from Baltimore, MD to Montreal. Tricia most recently worked for Youth MOVE Maryland through the Innovations Institute at the University of Maryland, and was pursuing her Bachelor of Social Work degree.

This is a tremendous loss to the youth movement, as Tricia had such a huge impact on youth empowerment and advocacy, and cross-systematic change on a national level. But we look forward to those of us who learned from her, taking this knowledge and passion forward to continue to positively effect change on youth and family serving systems. Please take time to process, heal, and reemerge from this tragic loss. We want to ensure the safety and well-being of all of us, as we were all family to Tricia.

Should any of you feel the need to process this information, need support, or the opportunity to work through this verbally, reach out to peer supports, adult allies, youth coordinators, mentors, and us at Youth MOVE National. youthmove@ffcmh.org [1] (240) 403-1901 or (202) 679-0452.

Please keep her and her family in your prayers. We encourage all to memorialize her by posting memories, comments and tributes to her Facebook page, as well as leaving comments on our webpage that we have set up: http://www.youthmovenational.org/remembering-tricialouise-gurley. [2]