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Your editorial "Wisdom in languages" (THES, February 9), following up Jim Coleman's call for nationally agreed standards for languages, was at once both encouraging and depressing. It was encouraging because of its acknowledgement of a need for recognised standards. It was depressing because precisely such a system is already in existence as a result of huge efforts in the early 1990s. The problem seems to be that the Centre for Information on Language Teaching and Research and the Languages Lead Body have not successfully marketed language standards to higher education, and that the latter has not regarded the issue as of sufficient importance.

MARTIN CROSS RSA examination board