ÁñÁ«ÊÓƵ

I'm sorry to intrude on your navel-gazing but I resent a paragraph in your touching article "Staff exposed to parent rage" (July 7) that is intended to be read as the straw that broke the back of the overworked striking lecturer: "parents were a 'heavy'Jconstituent of complainants about 'the recent action over pay'". You are implying that an understandable parental inquiry about my child's final exams is a demonstration of parental rage.

You then report incidences of "abusive phone calls from parents of children not accepted at university". I am proud to boast that my parental responsibility would extend even beyond a polite but anxious phone call about a crucial issue in the life of my 20-year-old daughter.

And the statistic in the article "Say no to bad behaviour, (July 7) - "1,000 incidents of students being aggressive towards university staff over the past five years" - does not fill me with angst. Could that not be more fairly rewritten as "fewer than two incidents of aggression per university, per annum?"

Higher education? Lower common sense.

Martin Hogg Bury St Edmunds