She was allowed to skip several grade levels and was awarded scholarships to attend private school.
She enrolled at the University of Berlin, but she found that she faced daunting obstacles there in the form of gender discrimination because she was pursuing studies in pure mathematics.
[citation needed] After graduation, she began working at a job teaching mathematics at a German high school from 1931 to 1933 when Adolf Hitler and the Nazis rose to power in Germany.
Käte lost her job because she was a Jew, as did Werner Fenchel, another German-born Jewish mathematician, who was removed from his teaching position in Göttingen.
However, in 1940, the Nazi forces invaded that country so the young family, with Käte's mother, left with thousands of other refugees for Sweden.