In the hall near the entrance of the Honors College, Cathy Pritchett’s doors are covered with theater production posters. She loves theater as much as she loves working students at the college, where she has called home for over a decade.
It’s not hard to spot Cathy’s outgoing personality around the college and her door is always open to students.
As a UTA grad with a BA in Music, she has always made the arts a part of her life. Cathy often plays a role in plays for UTA’s theater department. She loves performing and often sings in choirs, does music performance in churches and all sorts of odd things. For her, it’s more than a hobby.
“I call it my therapy,” she said. “I get to go and be somebody else for a couple of hours and I love that about musical theater.”
Cathy comes from a long line of Pritchett educators. Her father was a high school teacher and community college professor. Her grandfather was head of the sociology department at Southern Methodist University and her great great grandfather was president of Sam Houston State University.
When she first graduated, Cathy planned to teach. She got her teacher certification in 1991 but it wasn’t long before she realized that teaching wasn’t for her.
“It’s just I realized it wasn’t something I wanted to do every day,” she said.
That’s when her mentor suggested she look into grad school for education administration. She went to Texas A&M and earned her Masters of Science with an emphasis on education administration.
It was in 1994 that she returned to UTA and with a contract position with the office of alumni. After working a series of odd jobs throughout the university, she ended up with her job as director of programming for the Honors College
“It’s funny you know, a lot of people ask why I came back to UTA and it’s because I had such a good experience here as a student,” she said.
As for her future, she still loves performing but UTA will always be home for her.
“This is where I plan to stay until I die or at least until I retire,” she said with a chuckle.