An associate professor of private law, she taught in Dakar from 1962 to 1964 before returning to France and teaching in Dijon in 1969.
[2] On 20 March 1986, she was nominated by Prime Minister Jacques Chirac to become Secretary of State for Vocational Training.
[3] While serving in the National Assembly, Catala was a member of the Council of Paris, first elected in 1989 and re-elected in 1995 and 2001 on the list of the 14th arrondissement.
[4] In 2002, the RPR was dissolved and succeeded by the Union for a Popular Movement (UMP), which chose Dominique Versini [fr] as their candidate in that year's legislative election.
[6] On 7 July 1965, Catala married Raymond Franjou, the Socialist Party Mayor of Forcalquier, whom she divorced in 1972 after having a daughter, Marianne, in 1970 with him.