Everyone knows that the SAT is a pre-college ritual -- dreaded, anticipated, debated, and ultimately taken (and re-taken) by millions of high-school seniors.

Now comes news from Baylor Universitythat students already admitted to the college are being encouraged AND financially rewarded for re-taking the SATs -- as college students. Administrators there hatched a plan to motivate repeat test-takers in an effort to raise the college's rankings -- yes, Virginia, it's come to this, callous manipulation of students, test scores, and the testing process (plus a tidy $300 bookstore credit and $1000 merit scholarship award) to make the school appear more rigorous, and, they're betting, to raise the admissions bar for subsequent pools of applicants. (Average SAT scores got a 10-point bump in the re-test process, rising from 1200 to 121o, on a scale of 1800.)

With some colleges gaming the testing system, is it any wonder kids see the test as a hurdle to be jumped? Why not prep to the gills? Why look for a level playing field when institutions of higher learning have little qualm about reshaping the landscape -- in their own favor?