Community Calendar

The Community Foundation of the Mahoning Valley is now accepting applications for its 2025 scholarship opportunities. Those applying only need to fill out one universal application for all of the Foundation’s open scholarships. Applicants will complete a set of standard questions that determines what scholarships they are eligible for, and students are immediately prompted to provide any additional information needed for each eligible opportunity. Applications are due by the end of the day March 2 and can be found at CFMV.org/scholarships.

Scholarships are available for students meeting a variety of criteria, including current high school students as well as those already enrolled in a post-secondary education program. All Mahoning Valley students are encouraged to apply to ensure they don’t miss out on potential scholarship awards.

The Youngstown Playhouse presents Gem of the Ocean, by August Wilson, weekends from Friday, February 21 to Sunday, March 2, with Friday and Saturday performances at 7:30 pm, and the Sunday matinees at 2:30 pm. Set in 1904, the opening installment in Wilson’s The American Century Cycle includes the playwright’s most fantastical journey, where the secrets of the past point towards future liberation. Tickets and more information at youngstownplayhouse.org.

University Theatre presents "The Playboy of the Western World" weekends from Friday February 14th through Sunday February 23rd in the Spotlight Theatre of Bliss Hall, with Friday and Saturday performances at 7:30pm and Sunday matinees at 2:00pm.

Set against the rugged backdrop of rural Ireland, this timeless tale unfolds with humor, wit, and unexpected twists. Follow the charming yet controversial Christy Mahon as he captivates a small village with his tall tales of heroism, leading to laughter, scandal, and ultimately, an exploration of identity and acceptance.

Tickets are available at ysu.tix.com

The Hopewell Theatre, located on Mahoning Avenue, in Youngstown, presents the play Steal Away, weekends from Friday, February 21 through Sunday, March, 1, with evening performances at 7:30 pm, and the Sunday matinees at 2:00. Steal Away is set in Chicago during the Depression, featuring the story of 5 upstanding church ladies who raise funds to send young Black women to college by holding bake sales and the like. But when they are denied a bank loan, the ladies, inspired by the famous criminal John Dillinger, take drastic measures and rob a bank instead. Tickets and more information at hopewelltheatre.org.

Featuring Ramona S. Austin, Lois E. Thornton, Joy L. Smith, Dezaryé Inez Powell, Monica Beasley-Martin, Carla D. Gipson, and ShIree Wilson, stage manager.

The Community Foundation of the Mahoning Valley is now accepting applications for its 2025 scholarship opportunities. Those applying only need to fill out one universal application for all of the Foundation’s open scholarships. Applicants will complete a set of standard questions that determines what scholarships they are eligible for, and students are immediately prompted to provide any additional information needed for each eligible opportunity. Applications are due by the end of the day March 2 and can be found at CFMV.org/scholarships.

Scholarships are available for students meeting a variety of criteria, including current high school students as well as those already enrolled in a post-secondary education program. All Mahoning Valley students are encouraged to apply to ensure they don’t miss out on potential scholarship awards.

YSU's Cliffe College of Creative Arts will celebrate Black History Month in Bliss' Judith Rae Solomon Gallery, with the exhibit, Adornment, by Chrystal Miller, which explores Afro-futurism using unconventional materials, including beads, glitter, rhinestones, and foam. Miller holds an associate degree in Graphic Design and a bachelor’s degree in Painting, Sculpture, and Expanded Media from the Cleveland Institute of Art.

For more information, call 330.941.2307 or email kamerrill@ysu.edu

The YSU McDonough Museum of Art presents the exhibit, Underworld/Otherworld, by Anna Chapman, an artist and educator investigating transformative approaches to art making from Tuesday, January 21 through Friday, February 28.

In this exhibit, Chapman explores the question, "How do we move through the underworld to meet the Otherworld?”

There is a lecture by Anna Chapman on Wednesday, January 22, at 5:30 pm, at the McDonough. More information at ysu.edu/mcdonough-museum

The YSU McDonough Museum of Art presents the exhibit, The Dams are Broken, by Julia Betts, an Adjunct Professor at Carnegie Mellon University, from Tuesday, January 21 through Friday, February 28.

Betts describes this exhibit as oscillating between containment and release, shifting fluidly between abstract and recognizable forms.

There is a lecture by Julia Betts on Wednesday, February 5, at 5:30 pm. More information at ysu.edu/mcdonough-museum

The YSU McDonough Museum of Art presents the exhibit, Caught Skies and Pillowed Pines (Black Forest), by Sidney Mullis, a sculptor who lives and works in Pittsburgh, from Tuesday, January 21 through Friday, February 28.

Caught Skies and Pillowed Pines, " is a make-believe forest, an invented landscape to think about childhood selves and to find where they retreat to in adulthood."

There is a lecture by Sidney Mullis on Thursday, February 20, at 5:30 pm. More information at ysu.edu/mcdonough-museum

The McDonough Museum of Art presents an exhibition by director of artistic programming at the Wassaic Project in New York, William Hutnick, titled "QUEER HORIZONS," from Tuesday, January 21 through Friday, February 28. More information at ysu.edu/mcdonough-museum.

According to Hutnick, QUEER HORIZONS, is "the disruption of a heteronormative sense of time - and by extension, sense of place - is inherently queer, oscillating in a present tense that is not fixed. We’re moving at a pace that is becoming ridiculously challenging to keep up with, which, it seems, has little hope of slowing down anytime soon. The present is right now and just out of reach.”  

Hutnick's lecture will be on Thursday, February 27, 5:30 pm.