In Jonathan Stauffer’s engineering classroom, students are building trusses out of balsa wood. In the weeks ahead, those structures will be tested to see which designs hold up and which collapse under pressure. Down the hall, Mike McClellan’s freshmen are learning 3D modeling software—the same Autodesk Inventor platform used in many college engineering programs. When someone gets stuck, McClellan puts the question to the room. “Hey, anybody got a little strategy for this here?” he’ll ask. Usually, a student steps up and shows the class.

Together, Stauffer and McClellan lead Forreston’s Project Lead the Way engineering pathway, a hands-on program now in its eighth year that introduces students to design thinking and real-world problem solving. For a small rural high school, the opportunity is remarkable.  Students can select five different engineering courses including topics in civil, architecture and aerospace engineering.

McClellan, a veteran science teacher in his fourteenth year in the district, leads the entry-level Introduction to Engineering Design class. He commutes from Beloit each day—his car knows the way by now—driven by a commitment to the work. His role, as he puts it, is to “get the hook in them.” The class is heavily project-based. Students build paper roller coasters while analyzing kinetic and potential energy. They design Rube Goldberg machines using simple machines. And they spend significant time in the 3D software—enough that, by year’s end, half the class has surpassed their teacher. “If we didn’t do anything else,” McClellan says of the Autodesk training, “that would probably make that course worth it for the kids.”

Stauffer, who joined the district in 2020, picks up from there. Each new course he introduces requires extensive summer training, and he visits other PLTW programs at Winnebago and Byron to sharpen his approach. His courses—Principles of Engineering, and alternating years of civil or aerospace engineering—blend scientific theory with practical application. Students study simple machines, robotics, and control systems, then see those concepts tested in real time.

“It’s like applied physics,” Stauffer explains. “They can do the quick problems and also the labs that kind of give them sort of the real-time feedback.”

Failure is built into the curriculum. Stauffer even turns the word into a teaching tool. “Fail,” he tells his students, “is actually an acronym—First Attempt In Learning.”

That philosophy shapes the entire pathway. Students are encouraged to test ideas, analyze mistakes, and revise their designs. The goal isn’t perfection. It’s progress.

McClellan understands why that matters—because he lived the alternative. “So many times in high school, I was the same way,” he says. “I was kind of a taskmaster. I did my work, and I had the discipline, but I never really learned how to problem-solve until I was well into my college years.” That’s what he sees changing now. “We’re introducing kids to more of a problem-solving approach.”

The transformation is visible. “You can see them becoming more comfortable with struggling,” McClellan says. “The struggles that go on if something doesn’t work right away. Early on, they argue, and they blame, and they do all the things, and that kind of slowly goes away.”

By the time students reach their junior and senior years, the work grows more complex. Senior capstone projects ask students to identify a real-world problem, develop solutions, and present their ideas to a panel of engineers from the local community. Stauffer typically brings in four or five professionals—some active, some retired. Seth Gronewold, a Forreston alumnus now in civil engineering at Fehr Graham, has mentored students. John Jensen, a retired electrical engineer, has come in regularly to offer feedback and has even offered to connect students with corporate sponsors. Scott Schoonhoven has served as both mentor and judge.

This year’s capstone class includes six students—among them Danica Fong, the first female student in the program’s history to  take advantage of this  senior-level course. Stauffer calls it exciting for historical reasons. “She’s a natural leader,” he says. “Delegating different responsibilities. She’s not afraid to take the lead on that.”

But even for students who never pursue engineering professionally, the lessons hold. McClellan sees it in the maturity they carry into other classes—a more advanced, more patient way of approaching problems. And the skills embedded in that Autodesk training, in those Rube Goldberg machines, in those balsa wood trusses? Those skills travel with a student wherever they go.

As McClellan puts it, the pathway isn’t just teaching students how to engineer. It’s teaching them how to think.