In a classroom at St. Aloysius Academy for Boys, students barely tall enough to reach the tables are already thinking like engineers.
Some are coding. Others are testing sensors. All are documenting what didn’t work — and why.
This is not an after-school club or enrichment program. It’s a full, vertically integrated robotics and coding curriculum designed and built by Sister Sarah Ellen McGuire, IHM ’01, spanning Pre-kindergarten Montessori through eighth grade — something few elementary schools can claim.
“I want graduates to be prepared for their present reality — not just the future, but the world they’re already living in.”
A STEM Program Built From Scratch
When Sister Sarah arrived at St. Aloysius, she was teaching second grade. Robotics wasn’t part of the curriculum. In fact, it didn’t exist at all.
When her principal asked if she would be interested in starting a robotics program, she said yes and immediately began teaching herself.
Much of her early learning was self-taught, supplemented by formal coursework through Carnegie Mellon University and grounded in her master’s degree in Curriculum and Instruction from the University of Scranton. She quickly realized that meaningful STEM education required more than enthusiasm — it required structure.
“There really isn’t a ready-made robotics curriculum for elementary and middle schools,” she explains. “Especially not one that spans every grade.”
So she wrote her own.
Today, students at every grade level engage in developmentally appropriate robotics and coding experiences built on high school- and college-level concepts, carefully broken down to meet young learners where they are. Even four-year-olds build and code.
Learning to Fail, Successfully
From the first day of class, students learn that failure is part of the process.
“If the robot doesn’t move, it’s not the robot’s fault,” Sister Sarah tells them. “Is it the build? The code? What needs to change?”
That philosophy is intentional. Documentation, iteration, and reflection are expected from every student from first grade through eighth grade.
Seventh graders complete a major research project called Robots in the Workplace, studying companies that use robotics and exploring the careers behind the technology. Younger students bring stories to life through Robotics Readers Theater, designing and coding robots to perform scenes from books. Fourth graders tackle real-world challenges, like accessibility issues, by designing working robotic models to solve them.
“They see a problem,” she says. “And then they solve it.”
Competition and Core Values
Beyond the classroom, Sister Sarah coaches two competitive teams through First LEGO League, where robotics is as much about teamwork as technical skill.
Competition scoring is evenly split between robot performance, robot design, research, and core values—how students collaborate and treat one another.
“I always tell my students I’d rather win Core Values than anything else,” she says. “Because that recognizes who they are, not just what they can do.”
Her teams have earned more than 20 trophies, including multiple championships and awards for engineering excellence. Sister Sarah has also received the Outstanding Coach Mentor award six times, based on student nominations.
From Prendie to Purpose
Sister Sarah traces much of her leadership back to her years at Prendie, where faculty encouraged curiosity, faith, and impact.
“The teachers who meant the most to me were the ones who inspired us to be a force for good,” she says.
That belief now guides her work.
She doesn’t measure success by how many students pursue STEM careers. She measures it by how they think, collaborate, and adapt when things don’t go as planned.
Recently, a former student — now a high school senior — returned to tell her he has taken robotics every year since leaving St. Aloysius.
“He stopped by to tell me I inspired him,” she says, “and it meant the world to me.”
For Sister Sarah, inspiring curiosity and a love of STEM is the goal.
“I don’t need my students to remember me,” Sister Sarah says. “I want them to remember that they can make an impact.”