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Samantha Gallagher’s passion for knitting is evident in her daily wardrobe, from the sweaters she wears to work to the socks she stitches herself. Soon, she might even add handmade skirts and pants to her collection.

“Last year, I counted that I had made eight sweaters, eight tops, two blankets, and five pairs of socks,” Gallagher said.

For Gallagher, this fiber art is more than just a hobby. It’s a meditative practice that helps calm her mind while keeping her hands busy.

That calm is helpful in her current role as interim vice president of finance and administration. Since May 2024, Gallagher has taken on the duties of her boss, Steve Schwartz, who stepped up to become interim president following the departure of FLC President Tom Stritikus.

She also feels deeply knitted into the campus fabric. As a fourth-generation Fort Lewis College alumna, her familial ties to FLC stretch back nearly a century.

In her blood

Her great-grandfather, Herbert Billings, graduated from Fort Lewis College in 1928, where he studied agricultural farming before taking over his family's dairy farm in Animas Valley. Her grandfather, Ernest Shock, attended for two years before transferring to Colorado State University. He then joined the Navy, becoming a pilot. After his service, he returned to Durango, where he was a shop teacher at Miller Middle School.

“Our family has a framed picture of Herbert’s certificate from when he graduated,” Gallagher said of her great-grandfather.

Gallagher’s mother, Diane Doney, carried on the family’s Fort Lewis legacy, earning degrees in business administration and accounting after she married and began her family.

Gallagher earned college credits through a concurrent enrollment program at Durango High School. That made FLC the best option for Gallagher.

"I graduated with 28 credits from Pueblo Community College, and all of those credits would transfer to Fort Lewis," said Gallagher. "My parents had said they would cover half of my college costs," she said. "But with scholarships like the Old Fort Foundation Scholarship and the Presidential Scholarship, I didn’t have to pay anything."

Gallagher’s leadership skills and determination were evident as a student at FLC, where she played a pivotal role in bringing back the cheerleading team.

“Cheerleading was defunct when I came to college,” Gallagher said. She talked to her high school coach and then met with then-president Brad Bartel and pitched the idea of bringing it back. “President Bartel gave us $500 from his budget to help get us up and running.”

She took charge of recruiting, organizing, and building the team from scratch.

Big opportunity

Gallagher graduated with an accounting degree in 2006. It took her just three years with no loan debt, and she quickly landed a job with KPMG, one of the nation’s Big Four accounting firms.

“When I talk to people about coming to FLC, I tell them that Fort Lewis is a very small liberal arts college, and yet, one of these Big Four international accounting firms, they came down and recruited on campus when I was in college,” Gallagher said.

She credits Chris Lyon, a Certified Public Accountant who teaches accounting at FLC, as one of the reasons she was recruited. “Chris has always been an amazing Beta Alpha Psi adviser and has done an immense amount of outreach to local, regional, and national accounting firms to provide access and attention for Fort Lewis College accounting students.”

After working for KPMG and other firms, Gallagher transitioned to education, taking roles in the Sheridan School District and later Denver Public Schools, where she became the technical accounting and treasury director in just six years.

In 2019, she and her husband returned to Durango with their young children, and she joined Durango School District 9-R as director of finance. Within a year, she was promoted to chief financial officer.

Gallagher originally had no plans to leave that role. However, an opportunity at Fort Lewis College changed her trajectory in 2022, when Steve Elias, Dean of Katz School of Business at FLC, reached out because they had worked together within the Economic Alliance.

“He told me Fort Lewis was hiring a CFO and asked if I’d be interested,” recalled Gallagher, who initially hesitated. “I wasn’t really looking to leave the school district. Most of my career had been in K-12 school finance, so I hadn’t planned on making a change.”

But after conversations with colleagues and administrators, she realized it was an opportunity she couldn’t pass up.

“I came up to campus and met with Steve Schwartz and Tom Stritikus,” she said. “And the more I learned, the more intrigued I became.”

She decided to return to FLC as chief financial officer and associate vice president of finance and administration.

Job duties grow

Now, as interim vice president, she manages an even broader portfolio, overseeing finance, IT, facilities, public safety, and more.

“My role expanded from supervising financial operations, including accounting, purchasing, and budgeting, to also overseeing departments like the physical plant, planning, IT, the Old Fort, the Concert Hall, and the police department,” Gallagher said. Though she will officially return to Associate Vice President of Finance and Administration on July 1, some of the departmental oversight will stay with her, including Physical Plant, Planning, Design & Construction, Risk Management, and External Housing Initiatives in addition to the previously supervised finance operations.

Gallagher has been committed to seeking balance in her life, whether through her professional roles, her family, or her creative outlets. That balance became even more important when she returned to Durango in 2019 with her husband and two young children, and again now with her increased responsibilities.

“Between my job, my family, and my hobbies, I have to be intentional about how I spend my time,” she said. “That’s why knitting has become so important to me. It’s my way of unwinding and recentering.”

She discovered knitting as a child, but didn’t make it a hobby until her mid-20s.

“My grandmother taught me how to knit when I was about 8 years old,” she said. “She was a teacher and would watch my sister and me during the summers while our parents worked.”

The repetitive hand motions of knitting, she discovered, have neurological benefits that help her find balance.

“With two kids, a house, and a full-time job, knitting is one of the only things I do in my free time,” she said. “It’s such a great way for me to quiet my brain.”