Martha E. Casazza

Martha E. Casazza is an educator and author. Her life's work has been dedicated to teaching and learning. She has explored this on a global stage that started in Chicago and stretched to universities in South Africa, Poland, Kazakhstan, Scotland and England and Mexico. She focuses on access and support for underserved populations.

As a Fulbright Scholar in South Africa, following the end of Apartheid, Martha worked at the University of Port Elizabeth to introduce faculty to teaching the "new" students from the townships who had been underprepared for university study. As a consultant in Chicago, Martha collaborated with Instituto Progreso to create a college-level educational program to serve local Spanish-speaking residents in Pilsen. Based on this work, she was awarded the "Instituto Spirit Award" in 2018. Martha currently resides primarily in Sayulita, Mexico where she and her husband operate a tuition-free preschool for local children.

Her writings have evolved from nonfiction to fiction with her novels being based on her professional experiences and nonfiction research. Two of her nonfiction writings were cited as significant in the field of developmental education. Another, Dreaming Forward, an oral history of residents in a Mexican community of Chicago, was the subject of several NPR interviews.

Her most recent work, Fragile Courage, describes the challenges faced by a student from a Mexican-American family as she struggles to fit in at an American university while helping her family navigate the issues of immigration and possible deportation. She is currently working on a fictional account of what is happening to DEI offices on university campuses.