 After graduation, she traveled extensively throughout Mexico, Central and South America, Alaska, Samoa, and New Zealand.She subsequently obtained a master's degree in botany at the University of Hawaii—Honolulu with Sanford Siegel, a PhD in botany at the University of Wisconsin—Madison with Kenneth Keegstra, and did postdoctoral work with National Academy of Sciences Member Elizabeth Craig.Werner-Washburne joined the University of New Mexico as a faculty member in 1988.