Faculty Stories
Making a dream come true
A “coracle” is a small round boat about the size of a hula hoop. They were commonly used off of the coast of England and Ireland as fishing vessels. Professor of Marine Biology Emma Creaser, would watch these boats from the shore near her England home as a little girl. Her young explorations prompted her to do two projects as a primary school student—one on Charles Darwin and the other was the creation of a coral model. Those projects and the BBC television series “Life on Earth” and a show about underwater evolution had Creaser hooked on the ocean and passionate about marine life.
By the time she entered high school Professor Creaser knew she wanted to study marine biology or become a veterinarian. As with all lovers of the sea at the time, she watched the adventures of Jacques Cousteau with awe and admiration. She spent every chance she could by the seas and was even more passionate after visiting the famed Lyme Regis—home of historic fossils from the sea. She was also fascinated with heroes of Greek and Egyptian mythology such as Poseidon and Neptune, and absorbed herself in famous novels rich in maritime history such as the Iliad and the Odyssey. It was fate and passion that led her to study marine biology and zoology at Exeter University in England. She completed the honors program and earned her undergraduate degree in 1989.
In 1990, Professor Creaser ventured across the “big pond” to Florida where she entered the University of Southern Florida and studied starfish, sand dollars and sea cucumbers. It was there she worked toward a PhD in Biology and wrote a thesis about “echinoderm biomineralization” or the skeletal structure of sand dollars. She also met her husband Gary in Florida and both being from colder climates, decided Florida was too hot.
In 1997, Creaser was nearing completion of her doctorate and spied an advertisement in search of someone to teach physiology at Unity College in Maine. Almost from the beginning, Creaser dreamed of developing a marine biology program for Unity College. Creasers dream came true and a marine biology degree program was offered during the fall of 2006. Since then, the program has literally taken off and attracted students from coastal New England states as well as the southern coastal states of Florida and Texas. Because there are so few degree programs in marine biology through the United States, Unity College is also attracting students from Midwest and western states.
Common among students, faculty and staff at Unity College is “out of the box” thinking and a desire to experience new things. Creaser is proof positive of this and traded her scuba tanks for hip scarves and belly dancing. Creaser learned the art during a Mom’s night at her Bangor church and has since offered Belly Dancing as a Topics in Performance class at the college. Female and even a few male students have taken the class and showed off their talents during performances at the Unity College Center for the Performing Arts.
Settling into a passion for marine biology at Unity College has allowed Professor Emma Creaser to enjoy a balanced life in Maine as a healthy human being. She feels it’s important to be a role model to her students and her family. To be a good marine biology student at Unity College, Creaser says “you need it all” – flexibility, agility, great observation skills and the ability to gather and analyze data. Emma Creaser exemplifies passion for the environment shared by the Unity community.