In Memoriam: Catherine D. Baritaud

About

Catherine Baritaud (1943 - 2025) joined the department of Engineering and Society (E&S) in 1994, retiring in 2022. She earned two MAs: one English Literature from the University of Ottawa and one in Theater from the University of Northern Illinois. Before she joined E&S, Catherine taught at Clarkson University in Potsdam, New York, and at the State University of New York in Canton. In 1985 she became Associate Professor of Drama and Speech at Chesapeake College in Maryland, where, besides teaching, she produced plays for public performance. In 1989 she won a Mellon Foundation fellowship in theater. With her husband Richard, Catherine moved to Charlottesville in 1991, serving here as general manager of the Youth Orchestra of Charlottesville. Catherine established and led ESL instruction in E&S, and, with department chair Ingrid Soudek Townsend, was a cofounder of the LEEP program. Among many courses, Prof. Barituad taught “Utopias and the Technological Society” which covered sociotechnical implications of progress from several perspectives. She encouraged her students to look at not only the technical problems, but at the impact of the possible solutions, examining the unintended consequences of what some may perceive as improvements. Striving to make foreign students feel welcome at SEAS, she persuaded Dean Miksad to display flags in the A-wing, one for each of the countries SEAS students represented. She was also a renowned cook.

Education

B.A. English/Speech S.U.N.Y.Potsdam 1974 ​

MFA Technical Theater Northern Illinois University 1985

M.Ed University of Virginia 1992