Stephanie Ybarra is a program officer for Arts and Culture, shaping individual grantmaking and launch philanthropic initiatives in the performing arts, leveraging the grantmaking, convening, and research assets of the Foundation.

Prior to Mellon, Stephanie served as Artistic Director of Baltimore Center Stage, where she broke ground as the country's first Latina artistic director of a League of Resident Theaters (LORT) member theater. Over four seasons, she was instrumental in leveraging powerful artistic works as a catalyst for conversation, reflection, and action. With more than twenty years' experience in nearly all aspects of the theater both on stage and behind the scenes, she is a preeminent voice in the fight against racism and inequity in theater-establishing the Artists' Anti-Racism Coalition in 2016 to uproot the systemic racism in New York's off-Broadway theater community. In addition to staging compelling works, she has been instrumental in closely examining demographic data on playwright commissions, director hiring patterns, fighting for change related to pay equity, tiered fee systems, and even reviews.

In addition, Stephanie is a faculty member at The Juilliard School and New York University and is currently on the board of Citizen University, Make Believe Association and Maryland Citizens for the Arts, as well as the Artistic Council for the People's Theatre Project.

She holds her Master of Fine Arts from the Yale School of Drama and a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Baylor University.