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Authored by:

Tonya Edvalson

Membership Chair, SRAI

University of Utah

Email: tonya.edvalson@hsc.utah.edu

Our colleague, friend, and Board member Edward Black, passed away on Sunday, February 11, 2018. He was gracious with his tireless service to SRAI. Not only was he was a current member of the Board of Directors, he was currently serving as a member of the Membership Committee and was the President of the Government Division. He previously served on the By-Laws Committee, the Western Section President (2013-2014) and co-chaired the Annual International Meeting in San Antonio, among countless other volunteer opportunities. There aren’t many areas in SRAI that he didn’t have a hand in shaping. He did this all with the purpose of moving research administration forward. When he had a problem to solve, he moved forward by gathering the information and seeing it from every angle, representing everyone he could in the process. These are all of the things to be admired about our colleague and friend.

Ed spent most of his research administration career at the University of Utah, until three years ago when he moved to Denver, Colorado where he was the Executive Director at the Denver Research Institute, serving our veterans.

There are no words to express our gratitude to Ed for his friendship, his genuine kindness and mentorship to the members of SRAI. Since the news has spread throughout SRAI, many have reached out and shared thoughts, all of them of his cheerful nature, his willingness to help and genuine presence when you were with him. Our SRAI family is going to feel this loss.

Ed is leaving behind the best legacy of all - a beautiful family. His wonderful wife DeAnn (he called “the Mrs.”) and their four children. He loved them so much! Anyone that knows Ed, even a little bit, knows that they were his light. They even joined us for a few meetings – San Diego, Hawaii are the memorable ones.

We will miss Ed. It just won’t be the same without him. However, we will keep going with the purpose of moving research forward and with a smile, like he did. There is a fund that has been arranged for his family. Because of the private nature of the information, please contact Tonya Edvalson at tonya.edvalson@hsc.utah.edu if you are interested in contributing in his memory.

Thank you, Ed, for all that you did for us. We’ll take this from here and continue all the great things that you started for SRAI and the research administration profession.