“We asked HSA if they would discontinue the course, and the president agreed to that,” Queen said yesterday. “That’s where it stands as far as I’m concerned.”

But according to Gupta, he had intended at the time to agree to a far more limited accommodation of Queen’s wishes, because he misunderstood the dean’s request.

“We agreed to not enroll any Summer School students thinking that that group of students would not include Harvard College students that are in Cambridge working as Summer School proctors or Harvard College students cross-registering for a Summer School class,” he said. “Our confusion regarding term-time Harvard students stemmed from the fact that these students can take the course in September, and we therefore wouldn’t have thought to exclude them in our July and August courses.”

But Queen’s e-mail to the proctors last Sunday implied a more comprehensive ban on anyone taking the bartending course.

In response, HSA General Manager Robert Rombauer wrote Queen on Tuesday asking for clarification on what set of students the June 24 request had meant to encompass.

Queen replied yesterday to Rombauer confirming that he had intended to ask that HSA stop enrolling all students taking Summer School classes in its bartending course—including Harvard College students, who would be allowed to take the course during the academic year.

And Gupta told The Crimson yesterday that HSA would now comply with this larger definition.

“Moving forward…we have no problem in excluding these students from the course,” he said. “However, this course will continue to be offered to members of the Cambridge and Boston community, and to any students not enrolling in the Summer School.”

Queen said his attention to the bartending course resulted from a complaint lodged by the parents of a secondary-school student enrolled in the Summer School. The parents objected to the large banner with which HSA advertised the course in Harvard Yard during Summer School move-in. HSA’s promotion of alcohol to an audience including many minors, they wrote in an e-mail to Queen, was inappropriate.

Queen said he felt the lone complaint carried the weight of many.

“One parent took the trouble to send us a letter, but we’re assuming that there were others offended by it as well—the silent majority, as it were,” Queen said. “Since we have 1000 high school students attending, the largest constituency of the Summer School, we agree with the parents.”

Ekmekjian stressed that HSA has never let minors into its bartending course.

“We have a strict policy of not admitting anyone under 18, because that’s Massachusetts law, and we abide by that,” he said. “We never had any intention of enrolling anyone else, regardless of what school they were at, under that age.”

And he said that Queen had seen the banner in question and approved it before it was displayed.

“All the approvals were set in place,” said Ekmekjian.