Student Awards
History Day
The Nebraska History Day competition provides each 8th grader an opportunity to research a topic and create a visual or audio-visual project. The entire grade presents their work to parents, teachers, and the student body each January. Presentation format options are reports, slideshow presentations, and videos. Student work is judged at the event, and winners advance to the Nebraska History Day competition.
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SMM Robotics Club
The SMM Robotics Club is available to students in 4th- 8th grades and meets throughout the school year.
SMM's Robotics Club has grown since its first year of competition in 2016-2017. The commitment and enthusiasm of Robotics coaches and club members generate tournament success and rewarding experiences for all involved.
In 2025, all of the SMM elementary and middle school robotics teams were invited to and competed at the Nebraska VEX IQ State Championship in March at the SAC Museum in Ashland.
In the elementary division, the ‘Spicey Pickles’ placed 3rd in the finals! For the middle school division, the teams ‘Access Denied’ and ‘The Cult of Adolescent Nobodies,’ participated in the finals together and finished in 5th place!
In 2023, 3 teams competed in the 2023 State Championship Tournament. Team 68132 won 1st place! (Lucy L, Charlotte R, Colin M, Zoey K, the Taco Cats). The team was qualified to compete at the Worlds Competition in Dallas, TX, in May 2023. 
Robotics Club awards in recent years:
2025 - All of the SMM elementary and middle school robotics teams were invited to and competed at the Nebraska VEX IQ State Championship
Science Fair
The Annual St. Margaret Mary Science Fair is a celebration of students' scientific discoveries and a deeper understanding of the scientific method. Each year, 7th graders determine their topic for a science research project. Students build their projects over months to develop a theory, create a hypothesis, record results, and draw conclusions. Their compiled work goes on display each January for parents, teachers, and students to observe.
Judges score the students on their work and award a winner. Teams advance to the Metro Science and Engineering Fair each spring.
St. Thomas Aquinas Club (STAC) - Quiz Bowl Team
This was the team's first time competing in an Asynchronous 30-20-10 event. Questions are answered in three parts, from hardest to easiest, and points are earned for answering each part correctly.
8th Grade High School Scholarship Recipients
Congratulations to these 11 SMM 2025 8th Graders, who earned academic scholarships to Omaha area Catholic High Schools. Students were awarded merit scholarships based on their entrance exam scores from Creighton Prep, Duchesne Academy of the Sacred Heart, Marian High School, and Mt. Michael Benedictine High School
Additional Scholarships & Awards:
The 8th-grade awards day, held in May, is an annual tradition at St. Margaret Mary School. Parents join their children at an awards ceremony to recognize the class, their accomplishments, and celebrate memories from their time together.
Teachers and Administrators present several scholarships to 8th-grade students. Some of the scholarships require an application, and others are awarded through nominations. The scholarships awarded include the St. Margaret Mary Guild scholarship, Philip Kenny Memorial Vocal Music, the Vincent Manielli Athletic Award, the Knights of Columbus scholarship, the Lanoha Family Memorial Scholarship, and the Presidential Academic Award.
Faculty Awards
The St. Margaret Mary teachers and staff are devoted to the education of students from kindergarten to 8th grade. The community has offered special recognition for these outstanding faculty leaders.
Kate Rezac
Mrs. Kate Rezac is currently an Interventionist at St. Margaret Mary School. Before that, she was a 4th-grade teacher.
Rezac is the co-creator of Monarch Rescue: An Educator's Guide to Using Butterfly Gardens to Implement STREAM "an easy to implement resource for classroom teachers to create monarch rescue gardens as a tool for an authentic, project-based learning experience incorporating the STREAM model".
Kate Rezac is an Interventionist at St. Margaret Mary School where she shares her curiosity about monarchs and their environment with her students. Rezac recently participated in Notre Dame's Alliance for Catholic Education Program for Inclusive Education.
In 2014 Rezac wrote a grant proposal to build the Monarch Meadow and received funding from the National Catholic Education Association and was selected to receive an additional grant again the folllowing year . The Monarch Meadow is a certified schoolyard habitat and a Monarch Waystation, which provides monarchs the environment they need in order to sustain their 1000+ mile migration.
In class and outdoors in the Monarch Me
adow, 4th grade students discover the importance of providing for these marvelous migrating monarchs. Students see the necessity to create an "inn" and a place for monarchs and other pollinators to rest, find nourishment, and a home. The students take on the role of protector of the monarchs. Students further study the migration pattern of the monarchs from Mexico to Canada. Through their work, they participate in citizen science activities such as reporting sightings and tagging monarchs.
Third and fourth grade SMM students learn and understand their responsibility to be stewards of this beautiful creation.
Barb Gilman
Mrs. Barb Gilman teaches 3 grade at St. Margaret Mary School.
Cover feature Catholic Teacher Magazine Fall 2016
Saint Margaret Mary’s 3rd grade teacher, Barb Gilman, is featured on the cover of September’s issue of Catholic Teacher magazine. Gilman is honored for her dynamic work building community for both students and educators throughout the world. Gillman, a wife and mother of three, loves teaching in a Catholic school and keeping up with the latest teaching research.
While most of her 3rd grade students are tucked in at 8 am Saturday mornings, teacher Barb Gilman visits with other Catholic teachers from around the world on Catholic EdChat. Gilman, along with Nancy Caramanico, host the Twitter chat. Their audience includes administrators, diocesan officials, and teachers from across the world- even Sydney, Australia.
Nearly 8000 Catholic educators follow Gilman on Twitter and have tuned in to hear her present the last few years at the National Catholic Education Association conference. Gilman credits her collaboration with other educators on Twitter and at conferences for “reenergizing me every week.”
“As a teacher you can be very isolated with your students in the classroom. Every week I almost always come away with one good idea from the chat,” says Gilman.
2014 NCEA Distinguished Teacher for the Plains States
In 2014, she was awarded the NCEA Distinguished Teacher for the Plains States. “I love Catholic education and I believe we need to enrich and empower other Catholic teachers with the latest research and advice.” Gilman may also be found at Catholic EdCamp, which she helped start, at Creighton University each summer. You can also find her monthly blog post for Loyola Press- http://catechistsjourney.loyolapress.com/auth