Recognized by The Princeton Review as one of the nation’s top schools for theatre, the department’s 2026–27 season is set to feature four new productions that span comedy, mystery, musical theatre and drama, showcasing the work of student performers, designers, technicians and directors.

Upcoming 2026–27 Season

• The 39 Steps — Sept. 17–27, 2026
• Dear Evan Hansen — Nov. 5–22, 2026 
• Eureka Day — Feb. 4–14, 2027
• The Children’s Hour — April 8–18, 2027 

The fall season begins in September with The 39 Steps, a fast-paced adaptation of the Alfred Hitchcock classic that blends suspense with comedy. In November, audiences can experience Dear Evan Hansen, a Tony Award-winning musical that explores connection, identity and belonging in a digital world.

The spring semester kicks off with Eureka Day, Jonathan Spector’s contemporary comedy about community decision-making and public health before concluding with The Children’s Hour, Lillian Hellman’s landmark drama examining the consequences of rumor and misinformation.

All productions will be staged in Klein Theatre, with Pay-What-You-Can preview performances and post-show AfterWords discussions scheduled throughout the season. Additional ticket and season pass information will be available from UMW Theatre in the coming months. Learn more about the Department of Theatre and Dance and the 2026-27 season.

When University of Mary Washington College of Arts and Sciences Dean Keith Mellinger first visited Europe nearly 25 years ago, he found himself in a restaurant in Rome, off the beaten path, eating an eggplant dish he’d never heard of before.

“I didn’t even know that I had ordered it, but it was absolutely amazing,” Mellinger said of the meal that opened his eyes to tasting unfamiliar foods during his travels. He recalled a recent trip to Bilbao, Spain, with UMW Center for International Education Director Jose Sainz, where they enjoyed pintxos – small snacks, often held together by skewers – that are popular in the Basque region. “Again, such amazing food!”

That willingness to explore new culinary experiences and food traditions is what inspired the University to introduce “World on a Plate: A Journey Through Global Cuisines,” an online course that will be held during the summer session starting June 22. Classes will examine food as cultural text – covering topics like migration, colonialism, sustainability and celebrations – through scholarly readings, public lectures and live cooking demonstrations over Zoom. Read more about ‘World on a Plate.’

The newest graduates process to UMW’s Commencement with handshakes, hugs and high fives from Mary Washington faculty. Photo by Suzanne Carr Rossi.

With their Mary Wash blue regalia, caps decked out just for the day and smiles shared with family and friends, nearly 1,000 graduates traversed Campus Walk this morning for the University of Mary Washington’s 115th Commencement.

Followed by the faculty who’d guided them through the past four years, the Board of Visitors, President Troy D. Paino and the Eagle Pipe Band, the members of the Class of 2026 made their way to Ball Circle, where the three-hour ceremony unfolded. The chilly air warmed throughout the morning as family, friends and supporters cheered for the graduates’ hard work, perseverance and commitment to earning a degree with the power to enlighten their careers and their lives.

“The classes weren’t easy; it was challenging,” said Aidan Ramirez, an economics major from Stafford, Virginia, who chose Mary Washington for its small class sizes and opportunities to receive individual attention from professors. Read more about UMW’s 2026 Commencement.

Eight students received the Colgate W. Darden Jr. Award for achieving a perfect 4.0 grade point average. Photo by Suzanne Carr Rossi.

Each spring the University of Mary Washington Commencement sets the scene for years’ worth of accomplishments by students, with numerous credit hours in classrooms, labs, internships and extracurricular activities.

Eight University of Mary Washington graduates in 2026 marked the moment with a perfect 4.0 GPA, earning the Colgate W. Darden Jr. Award for Academic Achievement for completing their degrees with the highest grade-point average in the undergraduate program.

As they crossed the stage sharing in the honor – impressively becoming part of the largest group of Darden Award recipients in school history – they each get ready for what’s next through a variety of majors, minors, graduate programs and career paths. Read more about the 2026 Darden Award honorees.

UMW MBA student and Chief Mission Officer at Rappahannock Goodwill Industries, Marty Bywaters-Baldwin, works with Assistant Professor of Management Alexandra Dunn on an independent study to refine the CareerPath Accelerator — an interactive tool launched by Goodwill that uses evidence-based practices and AI to identify job seekers’ skill sets and match them with appropriate career paths.

With a demanding role in community service, University of Mary Washington MBA student Marty Bywaters-Baldwin is focused on helping others find their own meaningful work. And he’s using the latest technology to do it.

Chief mission officer at Rappahannock Goodwill Industries, he helped launch the CareerPath Accelerator, a tool that uses evidence-based practices and artificial intelligence to identify users’ skills and match them with suitable career paths.

“We’ve designed an interactive, scenario-based tryout where people can practice doing a job,” he said. “We then combine AI insights with support from Goodwill staff to provide career coaching or help create a plan for further training.”

As part of his MBA program at UMW, Bywaters-Baldwin is refining the CareerPath Accelerator through an independent study overseen by Associate Professor of Management Alexandra Dunn. While he combines emerging technology with a commitment to helping community members find sustainable, long-term careers, Dunn connects his work to theoretically grounded research and current developments in organizational behavior. Read more about MBA Student Connecting Classrom to Career and Community Service.

Senior Hannah Wall, a management and entrepreneurship major, took first place, winning $2,500, in UMW COB’s Blate-Schneibolk Strategy Case Competition.

The Blate-Schneibolk Strategy Case Competition took place in the College of Business (COB) on Thursday, April 16. Now in its 10th year, the bi-annual event began with a reception in Woodard Hall’s Red Room, with opening remarks from COB Dean Filiz Tabak.

The Case Competition pits teams from UMW’s 400-level Strategic Management course against one another in a quest to sort out a “case” of a struggling business. Participants tap into the concepts and skillsets they’ve collected in class to analyze issues, plan a path to success and impress a panel of judges. The challenge gives students the type of real-world experience they’ll likely encounter in their careers, plus the top three contenders walk away with cash prizes totaling $5,000.

This semester’s case, focused on Coursera and its AI strategy, was judged by Andrew Blate ’04 and Craig Schneibolk, co-owners of Beautiful Home Services, and Jenn Cole ’06, a Markel Insurtech Underwriters director.

“The judges were impressed by the creativity of the recommended strategies, the depth of the analysis and the professionalism of the presentations. They noted that this year’s presentations were the best since the competition began,” said UMW Assistant Professor of Management Samira Fallah. “The college is proud of the excellent work of its faculty, staff and students and looks forward to making the event even bigger and stronger in the future.”

Five teams competed, each delivering a 10-minute presentation followed by a five-minute question-and-answer session with the judges.

Senior Hannah Wall, a management and entrepreneurship major, took first place, winning $2,500. Seniors Lucy Gentry, a double major in marketing, and communications and digital studies, and Maria Torres, who is majoring in business administration, came in second, taking home $1,500; and Ashlyn Diederich, Kyra Frola, Marisol Juarez, Megan Fallin and Lindsay Price finished third, winning $1,000.

“The students were extremely well prepared, professional, and did a fantastic job,” Blate said. “I firmly believe that the Case Competition is one of the best displays of the amazing job the professors and staff are doing to create not only great students but ones who are ready for success in the future.”

Mary Washington alumna Cathie O’Connor Woteki ’69 and husband Tom in the doorway of the ‘Drs. Catherine O’Connor Woteki ’69 and Thomas H. Woteki Laboratory,’ in the Jepson Science Center, Room 416. K Pearlman Photography.

Cathie O’Connor Woteki ’69 and husband Tom have both led distinguished careers in government, industry and academia. Cathie got her start in STEM as an assistant in a lab in college – much like the one named for them last month in the University of Mary Washington’s Jepson Science Center – where she prepped solutions and lab equipment for experiments.

“I learned so much from that experience and my interactions with faculty,” said Cathie, who earned a bachelor’s degree in biology and chemistry at Mary Washington and went on to shape food safety policy for the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the White House. “I want to provide the same kinds of experiences for today’s students that I had in college.”

The Wotekis visited that fourth-floor lab for an unveiling, where UMW President Troy Paino, Provost Tim O’Donnell and College of Arts and Sciences Dean Keith Mellinger expressed their gratitude to the couple for their generous gifts. Current and retired science faculty and university staff gathered in the space, which Professor of Biology Lynn Lewis, director of the Irene Piscopo Rodgers School of Science, said will hold introductory and upper-level chemistry courses and be used for the Irene Piscopo Rodgers ’59 Summer Science Institute.

The couple have made gifts to the Class of 1969 50th Reunion Scholarship and the Fund for Mary Washington, but their greatest impact has come from their contributions to the Beyond the Classroom (BtC) Endowment since its inception. Read more about UMW Chemistry Classroom Naming.

The uniquely UMW tradition of Devil-Goat Day celebrated its 100th anniversary this year. Photo by Parker Michels-Boyce.

And … the Devils have it! At least for a year.

Devil-Goat Day at the University of Mary Washington was in full force for the 100th anniversary of the uniquely UMW tradition.

“Everything felt a little bigger and more meaningful,” Alyson Hardy, a senior majoring in communication and digital studies, said of the end-of-the-academic-year event that helps cut pre-exam tension. “There were more activities, and you could tell a lot of effort went into making it memorable.”

UMW’s Devil-Goat Day has students who graduate in odd years (Devils) battling it out against those who graduate in even years (Goats) in a friendly competition of school spirit, where participation counts, collecting points is all about fun, and an epic tug-of-war battle wraps it all up. Read more about Devil-Goat Day.

Students from across disciplines set up posters in the Hurley Convergence Center to share their research and creative work from the past academic year as part of UMW’s 20th annual Research and Creativity Day. Photo by Karen Pearlman.

A map tracing pollution threats to the Chesapeake Bay. An experiment repurposing a common heartburn medication to help kill cancer cells. A computer model built to predict sports injuries before they happen. Intricate artwork transforming a gallery space. A scene unfolding onstage.

At the University of Mary Washington, these aren’t hypothetical scenarios – they are real student projects presented at Research and Creativity Day, an annual tradition on the last day of classes that has now spanned two decades. The spring event brings together student research and creative work from nearly every major, with scientific studies, art exhibitions and performances filling venues across campus.

This year’s culminating symposium, hosted in the Hurley Convergence Center (HCC), closed out a weeklong celebration marking the event’s 20th anniversary. For the full story of how the day began and grew, see Research and Creativity Day Turns 20: A Celebration of Undergraduate Work Decades in the Making.

“I think the students really enjoy explaining their research to other students,” said Director of Undergraduate Research Betsy Lewis. “Even at the end of a busy week, there’s still a lot of energy at the final symposium.” Read more about Research and Creativity Day.