A BUCKINGHAMSHIRE New University lecturer said he was taken aback by the scale of today's national media interest following his call for some misspelt words to be overlooked.

Dr Ken Smith said many had misunderstood his suggestion that commonly misspelt words should be accepted by lecturers.

He said it was already acceptable for some words to have more than one spelling - and this should be extended to about 20 more words.

His views were published in today's Times Higher Education Supplement and created a storm of media interest.

In the article he said: "Instead of complaining about the state of the education system as we correct the same mistakes year after year, I've got a better idea.

"University teachers should simply accept as variant spelling those words our students most commonly misspell."

Dr Smith, a senior lecturer in criminology at the High Wycombe-based university, said: "I have been inundated with calls - it wasn't at all what I was expecting.

"I was expecting to write something of interest only to lecturers in higher education."

He said: "I am sure some are disagreeing because they don't understand what I am saying.

"I am not proposing spelling reform, I am not saying that people who can spell should un-lean what they learn at school or learn to spell these words differently.

"I am just saying we should allow a few more variants."

For example judgement was an accepted variation of judgment, he said.

Dr Smith, a lecturer at the university since 2003, said: "I think all universities in Britain are experiencing similar problems. I don't know if it's got anything to do with texting or the fact that people get their information from the internet these days.

"Perhaps people don't read quite as much as they used to or because most people don't go to grammar schools any more and they don't get taught this kind of thing."

He said grammar school pupils would "go to a lot of trouble to learn how to spell these words".

He added: "I don't see why, in the 21st century, we should go on spelling a word like opportunity the way we do just because that's the way we spell it."