Eminent NYU chemist fired after students complain about taxing organic chemistry course

The abrupt firing of renowned chemist Maitland Jones by New York University (NYU) has set off a firestorm in higher education and the chemistry community. The university terminated his contract just before the start of the autumn term, after 82 of his 350 organic chemistry students signed a petition complaining that his organic chemistry class was too difficult, and that they didn’t like the way that he ran the course.

As first reported by The New York Times, students who signed the petition claimed that Jones lacked empathy for those students faced with family or other personal problems. They also complained that his organic chemistry course workload amounted to two-and-a-half hours of lectures on top of up to four hours of lab work weekly, which was too much when other courses were taken into account.