Several couples shared their stories this year, and each one is special! Congratulations to all the alumni who started their journey together at YSU.
Majors: Education & Education
Both played basketball for YSU, Steve played ‘98-’01 and Jen played ‘01-’05
We met each other in ‘01 and started dating in 2002! Steve graduated and got hired by Youngstown schools and was a forever fan of Jen and women’s basketball!
Steve proposed to Jen in 2005 right after Jen’s senior year of basketball at YSU. Jen graduated in 2006 and got hired in Boardman where they reside! They got married in the summer of 2006 and now have 2 children. Maya who is a junior at Boardman high school and has committed to play volleyball at YSU in 2027! Michael who is an 8th grader at Boardman Glenwood! He loves basketball and hopes one day to play at the college level!
We were so thankful for YSU and athletics for bringing us together and finding our SOULMATE! YSU was our second family and always will be! So very proud to be a PENGUIN!🐧
Majors: Psychology and Counseling & Civil Engineering
Both played basketball for YSU, Steve played ‘98-’01 and Jen played ‘01-’05
We started dating in high school in 2013 but both of us attended YSU after. Got engaged on our 10 year dating anniversary in 2023 and will be getting married this year in August!
Majors: Dietetics & Dietetics
We met in my freshman year of college in my very first nutrition course (Food Science Management) in 2015. We were food lab partners and cooked together! We started to study together and became friends. We started dating in May 2017. We got married in July 2022!!
Majors: Italian Education and Masters in English & Music Performance and Masters in Communications
We met through mutual friends in the food court in Kilcawley during the Spring 2014 semester. Our friends knew we liked each other and decided to take things into their own hands. We started dating a couple of months after meeting. We first hung out together at the Butler Museum of Art, and we dated through both our undergrad and graduate programs. We had many adventures on campus together! We loved going to Inner Circle, Chick-fil-A, and Pressed. We got married in August 2020, where Phil asked both his roommates from living in the dorms (Cafaro House) on campus to be a part of the wedding. We’ve been together for almost 12 years now, married for 5, and we just adopted our son in December 2025.
Majors: Biology & Psychology
We both lived in Lyden house and my first night, my resident assistant asked the floor to meet up for a game night. He invited people from my floor and the one above us. Michael and I caught each others eyes that night. Then my second semester at YSU I became Michael’s resident assistant and lived on his floor. He came to every event I planned and would always swing by my room when I left my door open. We are now married, have a house, and adopted two perfect dogs.
Majors: Education & Education
It was a love match made on the 50 yard line! My husband and I met in 2013 when we both joined the YSU Marching Pride. We marched next to each other in our pre-game block. In that first season became friends, started dating and the rest is history. We have so many fond memories from our time in the Marching Pride. From playing at the rock after each home game, singing the alma mater with the team and traveling to Texas for the National Finals. When we were not on the field, we spent our time in the Beeghly Hall. After graduation we got engaged and got married in the summer of 2024. This year will be our 13 Valentine’s Day together.
Majors: Nutrition & Education
Jacob and I met through a mutual friend in the Cushwa lobby in the fall of 2014. I was on a break between classes and he was walking out of his class. We started dating in November of that year. Fast forward, we got married in October of 2020!
Majors: Education & Communications
In 2013, during our first semester at YSU, Nick and I met in a class in the Lincoln Building. On the last day of fall semester, I gave him my number, which led to us staying in touch and eventually dating in 2014. We were married in 2021.
Majors: Exercise Science and Masters of Health and Human Services & Social Work and Masters of Social Work
In 2000 Sara came into the bookstore, which was in Kilcawley center at the time, and I was the one to assist her with getting her textbook for the upcoming semester. She then joined Delta Zeta sorority and I was a member of Phi Kappa Tau fraternity and we became very close through greek life events. Little did I know when she came into the bookstore that day she said to her friend that she was going to marry me. We knew it was forever for us as we would sit in Ward Beecher hall waiting for my class to start or in the old Arby’s of Kilcawley center keeping each other company.
Majors: English & Anthropology and Philosophy
Tom and I met in Dr. Phil Brady’s Intro to Lit class in the fall of 2000. He asked me out for coffee after a YSU poetry reading featuring Gary Gildner and his book, “Blue Like the Heavens.” We became inseparable after that, enjoying our years on the YSU campus together. We were married in 2004 and have a son and a daughter. I work in the mental health field and Tom is a local attorney. We are forever grateful to have had the opportunity to meet during our time at YSU.
Majors: Marketing and Management & Applied Science
I graduated in June 1986 and married a YSU girl in 1988 and we were married until March 2014. Then my father passed away in June 2014 so I moved from Kent back to Massillon and Paula and I reconnected just before Valentine’s Day in 2015. We picked right up where we left off and dated until we were married in November 2024. We still make it back to YSU for football games in the fall and sometimes just to drive over to the Campus and grab a bite to eat or attend a concert downtown.
Majors: Psychology & Communications
We met on Honors move-in day in August of 2015 at Cafaro House and have been inseparable ever since. We started officially dating in 2019, got engaged in 2022, and married in 2023. We just recently celebrated our 3-year wedding anniversary.
Majors: Education & Computer Science
We met on campus my freshman year and his sophomore year of College. I tried out for the Penguinettes at the end of my freshman year, and he’s been at every single game since I made the team. I am so lucky to have met him because he pushes me to work hard as I end my time at YSU next Spring!
Our Penguin Mates feature is for our alumni who met at, or both attended, YSU and are now married. YSU Office of Alumni Engagement will be posting this around Valentine’s Day on our Facebook and Instagram pages, as well as a small feature in our e-newsletter.
Applications are due before February 7th!!!
Our Penguin Mates feature is for our alumni who met at, or both attended, YSU and are now married. YSU Office of Alumni Engagement will be posting this around Valentine’s Day on our Facebook and Instagram pages, as well as a small feature in our e-newsletter.
Applications are due before February 7th!!!