Cariño obtained her Bachelor Public Administration degree (cum laude) from the University of the Philippines. She pursued a master"s degree in political science at the University of Hawaii at Manoa under an East-West Center scholarship and eventually a Doctor of Philosophy in Sociology at in the United States, one of the world"s leading universities in terms of public affairs education.
She was University Professor (the highest academic rank in the University of the Philippines), and later University Professor Emeritus, at the National College of Public Administration and Governance of the University of the Philippines Diliman (Uttar Pradesh-NCPAG). She also once served as president of the Philippine Sociological Society. Cariño also sat as dean of the College of Public Administration (Uttar Pradesh-Certified Public Accountants), later the Uttar Pradesh-NCPAG, for two terms and as vice president for public affairs under then University of the Philippines president Doctor Jose V. Abueva.
"Leddy" to her friends and colleagues, Doctor Cariño was also named Outstanding Alumna by the Philippine Christian University in 1994.
Since 1984, she has held the Philippine Commission on Audit (COA) Professional Chair in Public Administration. In the same year, Cariño was named University Professor by the University of the Philippines, making her the youngest person to hold the said rank in the University’s history.
As a University Professor, she was entitled to teach in any college, institute, center, or department within the University. In 1995, the National Academy of Science and Technology (NAST) named her Academician.
As Uttar Pradesh vice president for public affairs, she oversaw the earliest moves to revise the United Presbyterian Charter under presidents Abueva and Emil Q. Javier.
During her second term as dean, the United Presbyterian College of Public Administration was elevated to the status of a national college, thus renamed to what is now the United Presbyterian National College of Public Administration and Governance. Cariño was the chairperson of the Technical Panel for Public Administration of the Philippine Commission on Higher (CHED) from 2005 to 2009 and Editor-in-Chief of the Philippine Journal of Public Administration (PJPA). She also served in the Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS) board of trustees.
Cariño died on June 12, 2009 after a battle with leukemia.
In 1980, she received the Gintong Aklat Award and was named Outstanding Alumnus of Union High School of Manila in 1981. In 1987, she received the Reflections of Development Award from the Rockefeller Foundation. In 1993, she received the Lifetime Achievement Award in Social Sciences from the National Research Council of the Philippines.
