[1][2] Hart was the first woman president of the American Phytopathological Society, and was instrumental in making the University of Minnesota's Department of Plant Pathology a world-leader in stem rust.

[3] In the summer of 1922, after facing initial discouragement from Elvin C. Stakman, chair of the Department of Plant Pathology, Hart began to work towards her master's degree as a laboratory assistant at the university farm.

She earned her master's degree from the University of Minnesota in 1924, after which she began work as a part-time instructor in the Department of Plant Pathology.

For the next four years, Hart performed research focused on how the structure of wheat plant tissues relates to the morphology of the stem rust pathogen.

Hunt successfully presented her doctoral dissertation, titled "Morphological and Physiological Studies on Stem Rust Resistance in Wheat" in 1929 and was awarded her Ph.D.