Scamming Scantrons

How would you like to be paid $300 to retake the SAT, with the promise that if you do well enough (improve your score by 50 points or more), you will be paid an additional $1,000/year?

Well sure, you say, why not? After all, high schoolers are taking the SAT eight times or something these days--why not pay them to take it, rather than the other way around?

Here's the rub: the SAT financial incentive plan I just mentioned is part of a college program for entering freshmen. Yes, Baylor University is paying their freshman $300 (in bookstore credit) to retake the SAT. Then, if the students improve their scores, they get scholarship money. If that sounds crooked, it is. It's the natural extension of the ratings craze amongst universities; here, the SAT is blatantly being used as nothing more than a tool to boost the school's number score in U.S. News and World Report.