Born and raised in sunny San Diego, California, Development Coordinator Katie Moog has a unique, detective-like skillset that she puts to work for the benefit of University Advancement’s prospect research team. Pairing that with her career nonprofit experience, she’s an invaluable member of the Gonzaga family for whom we are all grateful.
While nowadays, Katie can be found just about every morning (and some lunch hours) out running along the sidewalks and trails of Spokane, she was much less athletic growing up.
“I didn’t play any sports at all past the age of six,” she said. “I was a band kid—outside all the time in competitive, high-level marching band, which is physical, but it isn’t a sport.”
As a sophomore in college, Katie took a job many dream of—working on staff at Sea World Theme Park.
“I got to be outside all summer, right on the bay,” she recalled fondly.
It was there she met a young ROTC midshipman from University of San Diego, where she was headed after high school graduation to earn her degree in media studies. She took careful mental notes when they’d talk—he mentioned his Spanish class, his year in school, and his ROTC affiliation—which she called upon to deduce where and when she might be able to find him on campus.
“The next week, I just happened to be sitting outside one of his classes right around lunchtime,” Katie laughed. “We’d never seen each other on campus before and he thought it very suspicious.” The pair went out to lunch, and as Katie puts it, “the rest is history.”
Katie and Jon married shortly after graduation and his commissioning into the U.S. Navy.
As the couple moved around based on Jon’s Naval assignments, Katie worked for the USS Bowfin and Pacific Fleet Submarine Museum at Pearl Harbor, and with the Botanical Garden in Norfolk, Virginia. Their firstborn daughter Morgan was born while Jon was deployed. Their son Zach came along a few years later after Jon retired and the Moogs decided to return to California—this time, landing in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Katie found a job at the Silicon Valley Community Foundation doing gift processing—the same role she assumed at Gonzaga when she first joined the Advancement team. She and Jon visited in 2015, just following the devastating November windstorm.
“Everyone was apologizing to us, saying, ‘it isn’t always like this!’” said Katie, who started her job search after getting the kids settled into their new community. Having been a student musician herself, Katie got involved in the kids’ elementary school music program, helping with administrative tasks and running clarinet sectional rehearsals for the band. She also took a part-time position with Spokane Public Radio before finding her fit as a gift accounting assistant at Gonzaga. For five years, she processed thousands of donations each year, coordinating receipts and thank-you letters, too.
In the spring of 2022, Katie accepted a role in prospect management as a development coordinator, where her innate sense of determination and skills of deduction can be put to work helping connect fundraisers to people wanting to make an impact.
“It’s always been my thing,” she explained, “if I see something I want, I just forge a path and get there.”
At home, Katie, her husband and two children and two dogs enjoy getting outdoors and sampling the sweet treats her daughter bakes (she sometimes brings them in for her colleagues to enjoy, too!).
University Advancement is lucky to count Katie among its family of colleagues and is grateful for all she brings to the table.