DURANGO— Over the past 27 years, James Bodine has elevated his tech skills as computers have become a more significant part of Fort Lewis College. Now, he will oversee IT services on campus as the director of information technology. 

Bodine served as interim manager after Matthew McGlamery's recent retirement. Before that, he filled McGlamery’s role when he was on leave.  

Those experiences prepared Bodine to lead the critical FLC department.  

"James brings an immense breadth of understanding of information technology to the CIO position,” said Interim President Steve Schwartz. “With an amazing work ethic, desire to learn, and passion for FLC, James is the perfect person to lead our amazing team of IT professionals." 

“This is a position where you have to think differently and look at the long term,” said Bodine. “I was always impressed with the decisions Matthew McGlamery made, and I hope to be able to make good strategic decisions in the same manner that he did.” 

Bodine started his career at FLC as a lab coordinator and IT professional and worked his way up to manager of middleware services in 2007. During his 15 years in that role, he provided technical support in maintaining the college's daily operations, overseeing a multitude of software systems and web services.  

He credits his career path in technology to his alma mater. After graduating in 1994, Bodine returned to FLC the following fall to take computer science classes. He was hired as a student in the summer of 1996 and made full-time in the fall. 

“Back when I was a chemistry major, I bought my first computer because I had lots of work to do with spreadsheets and calculations and things like that,” Bodine said. “I just started tinkering around with it a little bit. When I graduated, I wasn't quite sure what I wanted to do for the rest of my life, so I decided to take a few computer science classes and got hooked. Then, I got hired full-time, and that's where I've been ever since.” 

The IT system at FLC has changed over nearly three decades, and the explosion of the Internet has contributed much to that transformation.  

“There's so much that we access in the cloud nowadays,” Bodine said. “Back then, people didn't really use the internet much. You had a lot of Word documents and spreadsheets and maybe email, and that was kind of it. But nowadays, everybody's on social media and news sites, and there is a lot of software we access in the cloud, including Workday.”  

He will oversee a team of nearly 30 people. When he came, there were fewer than 15 people. A growing focus is providing security for FLC’s computer network system. 

“Every year, security becomes more and more important,” said Bodine. “I have a cybersecurity and compliance analyst we hired five years ago. With so many regulations today, we to comply with those regulations and educate users on our campus. It’s mandatory that you have a position like that because it is a full-time job.” 

When he’s not on campus, the Durango native is on his bike. His passion for mountain and road biking dates back to his college days as the National Collegiate Mountain Bike Champion in 1994 and 1995. 

“We're so lucky with the number of trails we have here in Durango, from in-town to high country trails,” said Bodine. “We're just so blessed with what we have.”