Professor ‘slept with student and marked her work’

‘He took advantage’

A MARRIED fine art professor had sex with a student half his age before he went on to mark her final dissertation, a tribunal has heard.

Dr Jonathan Dronsfield, 54, was sacked by Reading University after it emerged they had sex following a boozy night out at a London gallery opening.

Now he is claiming unfair dismissal and has suggested he would not have been fired if he were a female academic.

At the hearing at Watford Employment Tribunal, Dr Dronsfield admitted sleeping with the 25-year-old, who cannot be named for legal reasons, but claims he should not have been sacked as they had sex once and she ‘made a pass’ at him.

The affair emerged when the woman’s former boyfriend emailed the university in 2013, claiming: ‘He has been having sex with students who he is responsible for tutoring. She was going through a breakdown. She was in a vulnerable place and he took advantage.’

It is not against university rules for staff to sleep with students, but it is forbidden if they are teaching them.

Dr Dronsfield was sacked in 2014 for having a sexual relationship with a vulnerable student, failing to report the relationship and abuse of power leading to a conflict of interest.

No evidence of a ‘predatory intent’ was found by university investigators and it was concluded that the affair had no impact on the student’s dissertation, which he marked.

The hearing was told that Dr Dronsfield drank cocktails with the student after a visit to a gallery in London before going back to a hotel for sex in 2011.

Dr Dronsfield initially lodged a claim of sex discrimination. He later withdrew it and instead maintained simply that he had been unfairly dismissed.

The tribunal will give its decision later.