Monkey business: Book Review by Dr. Jeffrey R. Brown

Copied with permission:

Sometimes a little controversy helps. Dr. Caroline Crocker has set one rolling that probably will not stop with the publication of her book. Having studied biology on the undergraduate level, I can only say that Dr. Crocker is one classy teacher: knows her field, is a proven scientist, and wants to reach for all she can to make her students learn. She does not just teach, she cares. Her help to students with heart-wrenching life stories has won her long term admiration and friendship. Any Ph.D. who is so successful at developing the uninitiated into competent scholars of the complexities of biology is what most colleges and universities crave.

It is unfortunate that George Mason University gave Dr. Crocker the boot. They lost one of their best professors. Caroline Crocker is obviously a person who challenges others to think. That brought her to grief in the university (and she has since not been able to find another faculty position elsewhere). But don’t expect her to stop now that she is outside of it.

“Free to Think” is the stimulating story of a highly motivated college prof who ran into trouble through a little naivete. She raised questions about Darwinian evolution in some of her lectures. The university’s loss is our gain. We get to see from the inside how sometimes the hallowed halls of the pursuit of ideas become machines of dogma. We also get to know what it is like to run afoul of one’s superiors. We get treated to humor in tense situations: like meeting the Ebenezer Scrooge of the academic world in the grievance committee. He declares her cartoons are degrading for a university lecture.

You will not find a bitter vent in this book. It presents instead, the fascinating story of being the center of controversy on campus. We learn how the lady thinks, and how almost irresistibly she gets others to think as well. When you finish, you will probably say with me, “Keep at it, Dr. Crocker.”