Following elementary and secondary education under the Religious Sisters of the Sacred Heart in Montreal, Katherine Waters studied English at McGill University and then at Oxford University. In 1962 she became the first woman hired to teach at Loyola College. After its merger in 1974 with Sir George Williams University to form Concordia University, she continued teaching English at Concordia. She was active in university and feminist politics. She was one of the founders of Concordia University's Simone de Beauvoir Institute. She was intensely and continuously involved in university political and service work for many years. She retired in 1996.