Margarita Casas was born in Mexico City, Mexico. She completed her bachelor's degree in sciences and techniques of communication in Guadalajara, Mexico. She holds two master's degrees from Colorado State University, one in Spanish literature with an emphasis on education, and the other in Teaching English as a Second Language. Currently, she is an instructor of Spanish at Linn-Benton Community College, where she served as Foreign Language Department chair for 11 years. She has collaborated on two textbooks prior to EXPLORACIONES and has published a novel, Italia En Cuatro Estaciones, winner of the first Literature contest of the Universidad de Guadalajara. She is an avid traveler who hopes to inspire her students to travel and see the world by themselves.