[1] From there she went on to the University of Maine graduating from the Farmington campus in 1971 with her teaching certificate and a bachelor of science in both elementary and junior high education.
[1] Battiste spent twenty-five years in Cape Breton where she worked alongside James (Sakej) Youngblood Henderson with young Mi'kmaq students helping them become teacher and lawyers, as well as fighting for their admittance into universities.
[3] The work Battiste and Henderson did together grew the number of Mi'kmaq teachers from a few to sixty, and the addition of ten lawyers where there had previously been none.
[3] She has also served on a multitude of different boards as well as a delegate to the United Nations' Workshop on Indigenous Peoples and Higher Education.
[5] Her list of honours also includes the 1985 Woman of the Year award from the Sydney, Nova Scotia Professional and Business Women's Society.