Dr. Catherine Ingold

AUP President 1989–92

Dr. Catherine Ingold was the first woman to hold the presidency of The American University of Paris. She led the University from 1989 to 1992, the period following the institution’s name-change from ACP to AUP. During her tenure, AUP constructed the Grenelle building, which provided much needed classroom and office space, securing the University’s future in the 7th arrondissement. 

Dr. Ingold holds an MA in Romance Linguistics and a PhD in French from the University of Virginia. She led a varied career in higher education that also saw her serve as a foreign language department chair, as Dean of Arts and Sciences, and as Provost of Gallauget University. In 1996, she joined the National Foreign Language Center (NFLC) at the University of Maryland, where she stayed until her retirement in June 2015, by which time she was the NFLC’s Executive Director. 

She served as principal investigator for the Analysis and Language Learning (ALL) contract, which was formerly LangNet, the NFLC’s federally funded project to develop e-learning materials at high proficiency in critical languages. She was also the principal investigator of the STARTALK project, which sponsored summer programs for teachers and learners of critical languages in more than 40 states.  

Dr. Ingold’s other interests include US language policy, heritage language development, the education of translators and interpreters, and supporting language access under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act. Her languages, in descending order of proficiency, are English, French, Spanish, American Sign Language, German, Italian and Portuguese.