Imagine a world where ice buckets and picnic coolers are obsolete. Picture a soldier on a desert assignment, able to turn water ice-cold in less than a minute. Or an astronaut, chilling beverages in space without a power source. YSU alumnus Mitchell Joseph has the technology to make it all possible ­– the patented “Chill-Can,” the world’s first self-chilling beverage container. Now the California business owner and entrepreneur is bringing his company’s invention home, back to the East Side Youngstown neighborhood where he was born, to build a $20 million Chill-Can Beverage and Technology

By Paul McFadden, president, YSU Foundation Doesn't everybody like the idea of leaving a legacy, something positive for which we can be remembered? The desire often becomes stronger as we see our birthday candles increasing in number. At YSU, hundreds of alumni and friends have discovered an amazing way to create a forever legacy – they’ve established scholarship endowments that literally go on giving in perpetuity. An endowed scholarship at the YSU Foundation can be used to memorialize the donor, or the donor’s friend or loved one. Because they continue indefinitely, endowed scholarships can

When Mirta Reyes-Chapman landed her first engineering job in the 1980s, manufacturers didn’t make steel-toed work boots in women’s sizes – and her presence on construction sites raised plenty of eyebrows among her male counterparts. “People never saw women in the field at that time. When I said I was the construction inspector, they didn’t believe me,” she remembers with a smile. “It was new, unheard of, but I was just a person trying to do my job.” Then a single mother and non-traditional student, Reyes-Chapman was determined to make a good living for herself and her son. She completed her

Four years ago, Bill Barna was at Howland Middle School in Trumbull County, leading a full-fledged active shooter training scenario for local police, teachers, principals and students. There were guns firing blanks. Students running the halls. Victims. And even fake blood. That’s when Barna, a 30-year veteran officer of the Howland Police Department, noticed something alarming: the doors. Doors leading into classrooms could be locked, but the locked doors could be easily broken into, leaving children and teachers vulnerable. “We needed to do something more to shore-up

Moose nose soup and boiled fish heads. Winter nights that last 19 hours or more – and endless summer days. That’s life in Alaska, and recent YSU grad Racquel Wright has been learning to adapt since she moved to the remote Southern Alaska village of Newhalen to accept a school counseling position last year. Born and raised in New Castle, Pa., Wright earned an undergraduate degree from Penn State Behrend in Erie, Pa., then enrolled in YSU’s graduate Mental Health Counseling program. Serendipitously, she signed up for School Counseling Ethics class by mistake, loved it, and switched to the School

David Stout clearly recalls the time he attended his first meeting of the Board of Directors of the American Accounting Association, the largest community of accountants in academia. “We went around the table and one by one introduced ourselves,” Stout says. “There was someone from Michigan State, from North Carolina, from Northwestern, from the University of Pittsburgh and Arkansas and Brigham Young and so on and so on.” And there was David Stout from Youngstown State University. “To have a seat at that table with representatives from all of those other prestigious schools is certainly a

“You look great … Have you lost weight?” It’s a greeting most people enjoy hearing, but a group of YSU professors have a problem with it. They say compliments focused on looks alone just reinforce our culture’s unhealthy preoccupation with physical appearance. “Let’s talk about other things, like kindness and thoughtfulness, not what someone looks like,” said Priscilla Gitimu, one of six Human Ecology faculty researching deadly eating disorders and the behaviors that lead to them. The research team’s primary goal, after its study revealed that more than 65 percent of their student survey

Dynamic, Determined and Discerning, at Work, at Home and in the Community We don’t need a map to tell us that Penguin Country is vast and wide. Those of us who wear our Penguin pride on our sleeves and travel around the country a bit can attest that there are YSU graduates, parents and supporters everywhere. There’s hardly a place we go where we don’t run into someone who went to YSU or knows someone who attended YSU. The map on the Alumni News page surely bears that to be true. From Hawaii (49) and Alaska (38) to California (1,455) and Florida (3,297), Youngstown State University graduates

Hospital Executive Appointed to YSU Board of Trustees Anita Hackstedde, president and chief executive officer of Salem Regional Medical Center, is the newest member of the YSU Board of Trustees. A resident of Columbiana, Ohio, Hackstedde earned a bachelor’s degree in Biology with a minor in Chemistry from YSU in 1990 and a medical degree from Ohio State University College of Medicine in 1994. She served as director of Student Health at YSU from 1998 to 2006. Gov. John Kasich appointed Hackstedde to the board to fill the unexpired term of James B. Greene, who died last year. Hackstedde’s term

Headline writers from around the nation used a wide range of adjectives to describe the last-second touchdown catch that gave the YSU Penguins a 40-38 win over Eastern Washington in a frigid FSC Championship semifinal game in Cheney, Wash. SB Nation was even more direct: "One of the greatest catches of all time." The grab by tight end Kevin Rader, made as he wrapped his arms around a defender, sent the Penguins to Frisco, Texas, and a chance to win the university's fifth FCS National Championship game. While the 'Guins fell to James Madison in the title match up, Head Coach Bo Pelini's second

Every spring, YSU Magazine sends out a call to university faculty and staff, inviting them to announce their newly published books, computer applications, musical recordings, art and photo exhibitions. We are never disappointed. Read on, and find out why our exceptional YSU faculty and staff make us “Y and Proud!” Finding Grit: The No Nonsense Guide for Raising Your Daughter to be Successful in Athletics, School and Life, by Don Martin, professor, Counseling. Drawing from his own experience as the father of two successful adult daughters, Martin’s newest parenting book promotes school sports

From coast to coast, Youngstown State University’s 105,000+ graduates reside in every state in the nation and in 78 countries worldwide. Ohio residents make up 60 percent of the total, followed by Pennsylvania, Florida, California, North Carolina and Texas, in that order. Our alumni serve as ambassadors for YSU – living, working, learning and leading in the communities in which they live. YSU’s Office of Alumni Engagement is launching a new program for recent graduates and alumni who are relocating for career reasons. “Alumni Connect” will link YSU alumni moving to a new area with a YSU

1950's 1960's 1970's 1980's 1990's 2000's 2010's ’50s Identical twin sisters and YSU alumni Charlotte Italiano of Canfield, ’54 BSEd, and Rose Italiano Pacalo of North Lima, ’55 BS in Medical Technology, enjoy dressing alike to compete at the annual Twins Day Festival in Twinsburg, Ohio. Held every August, the event is billed as the world’s largest gathering of twins. Charlotte is an Ursuline sister and director of Classroom Management at St. Joseph the Provider School in Youngstown; Rose is a retired teacher. Top ’60s Don Bartelmay of Aiken, S.C., ’64 BA in History and Political Science, is

Computer Science Professor Bonita Sharif is the first faculty member in YSU history to win the National Science Foundation’s highly competitive CAREER Award for Early Career Development. Sharif, an associate professor of Computer Science and Information Systems who joined YSU’s College of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics in 2011, was awarded a five-year, $416,000 federal research grant. The grant is considered the NSF’s most prestigious honor for junior faculty nationwide. "This national recognition speaks to Dr. Sharif’s expertise and her growing prominence in her field,"

With advanced degrees, online programs and more gender diversity, YSU’s Department of Nursing has made some radical changes since it began as an associate degree program in 1967. This year, as the department celebrates its Golden Anniversary, Nursing ranks as YSU’s sixth largest program, with 405 undergraduate and graduate students and 4,556 alumni. Nursing was considered mostly a female profession for many years, but no more – Nancy Wagner, professor and chair of Nursing, said 20 percent of YSU’s nursing students are men, among the highest percentages in the state. The Nursing program offers