Thirteen alternatives to using competency based tests should be considered when diagnosing student competency in writing: teacher-made or departmental tests, teacher-student conferences, contractual grade agreements between student and teacher, student self-evaluation, individualized goal setting, keeping files or portfolios of student work, teachers' written comments on student papers, rating scales, diagnosing student growth in their handling of syntactic structures, peer criticism (workshop approach), collaborative learning (students teaching one another in mutual-interest groups), staff grading/cross grading (groups of teachers grade the same papers), and games/contests. Since English is too complex a subject to be measured by a single test, teachers can get a more accurate and fairer evaluation of student writing skills by using many kinds of evaluation methods. (RL)