English majors who were blocked out of core courses during registration for next semester shouldn’t worry about fulfilling requirements, according to department officials.

As English classes began to fill up, members of the department put a temporary hold on six courses: ENG 227, 228, 245, 300M, 300P and 300W. The hold was lifted Tuesday, but a note was left on the first three courses allowing only sophomores to register. On Wednesday, all six courses were open to all students.

“We wanted to make sure that they [sophomores] had a chance to register too,” said Robert Micklus, undergraduate director of the English department.

All of the courses were full at press time, except for ENG 228, which Micklus said had a significant number of spots left.

While department heads had hoped for the six courses to have similar enrollment numbers to this semester — which ranged from 176 to 240 — the number of spots open at the beginning of registration was 96 for four of the courses and 120 for the other two, Micklus said.

Student Association Academic Vice President Peter Spaet blamed the chop in enrollments on budget cuts, while professors within the department said the addition of a new writing course is at fault.

Gayle Whittier, an English professor, said that graduate students who would have headed discussions in upper level courses are expecting to be assigned to WRIT 111, consequently leaving less resources for the traditionally large enrollments of ENG 227, 228, 245, 300M, 300P and 300W.

But Spaet said the faculty for WRIT 111 is drawn from a different pool than that of the six courses, and that the two are “unrelated.”

“The budget cuts are the main reason, it has nothing to do with WRIT 111,” he added.

While ENG 227, 228 and 245 are core courses for English majors, the other three are electives. All of the courses are offered each semester, and students can sometimes substitute certain courses to fill requirements, like British Fiction for British Literature.

Although he couldn’t comment on whether the numbers would change for future semesters, Micklus stressed that the main concern of department heads is to be able to offer core courses at numbers large enough for all English majors.

“We don’t want students to worry,” he said. “We’ll find a way to make sure they meet their requirements before they graduate.”