Gaming college rankings

Of all the ways of gaming college rankings, this has got to be the most devious:

Baylor University in Waco, Tex., which has a goal of rising to the first tier of national college rankings, last June offered its admitted freshmen a $300 campus bookstore credit to retake the SAT, and $1,000 a year in merit scholarship aid for those who raised their scores by at least 50 points.

These students are already admitted, so why should they retake an admission test?

When other colleges try to game rankings, they try to admit better students earlier, or award merit-based scholarships or classify temporary instructors as faculty. But trust the Baptists to zero in on the core rottenness in the system.

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