 Sauer attended the University of Notre Dame's Honors Program.In 1990 he moved to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to study at Carnegie Mellon University and in 1998 received a PhD in English—Literary and Cultural Theory, with a dissertation about miscommunication between employees and managers in 1990s Internet projects, and its origins in British and French publishing history.While he was at Carnegie Mellon, he was a founding member (and later, director) of the English Server (later the EServer), which he led to publish writings in arts and humanities free of charge online.