Your Jan. 29 article, "English requirement may hinder graduate students," concerning the Graduate Student Association's discussion of English 418 as a solution to the Graduate School language skills requirement seems to be based upon incomplete information.

Needless to say, the language skills requirement is not an English department requirement, as your title might lead some to believe, but a requirement of the Graduate School. And while the English department is willing to work with the Graduate Council and individual graduate programs to solve problems posed by this requirement, an undergraduate course in advanced technical writing, not "technical English," as your article states, is not the solution.

In fact, the very aspects of the course that now make it so valuable to graduate students -- instruction by qualified regular faculty and small class size -- would be endangered if we merely added sections to meet demand.

As a department we accept responsibility for offering two courses in writing to every undergraduate at Penn State, but it is unreasonable to assume we can also shoulder the responsibility for all graduate students whose writing in English makes it difficult for them to meet the thesis demands of their departments.

The problem is complicated by the fact that, since English 418 is not designed for graduate students, we give enrollment priority to liberal arts undergraduates.

We have attempted to accommodate as many graduate students as we can, but increasing demand for English 418 has forced me into the position of having to tell students who have come to me to plead for admittance into the course to speak to their department heads and graduate deans about the essential injustice of requiring them to take a course that they can't get into.

After all, responsibility for the writing competence of graduate students cannot be the responsibility of the English department alone, but must be shared with the departments and colleges in which those students are pursuing advanced degrees.

So, the GSA should be reassured that neither the Graduate School nor the English department is inured to the plight of graduate students in need of help with meeting the demands of the language skills requirement.

The English 418 matter was brought to the attention of the Graduate Council Committee on Academic Standards last summer. When I met with that committee in the fall, we discussed a number of possible alternatives to English 418 as a means of fulfilling the language skills requirement of the Graduate School. Whatever action is taken, council members will surely have the welfare of present and future graduate students foremost in mind, and their decision will be based upon a fair assessment of the capabilities and resources of the University's various departments and programs.