Baylor University's recent discontinuation of a policy to compensate students for retaking the SATs prompted discussion about the emphasis colleges place on nationwide rankings.
The university, located in Waco, Texas, offered incoming freshman students $300 in bookstore credit to retake the SATs this past June. If students improved their scores by 50 points, they would receive a $1000 scholarship toward their tuition, according to The New York Times.
Of the 3,000 students in Baylor's current freshman class, 861 students agreed to retake the test in exchange for bookstore credit. About 150 of these students qualified to receive the $1,000 scholarship, according to The Times.
Nathan Politi, a sophomore in the Kogod School of Business, said he thinks the perceived emphasis Baylor put on improving its nationwide rankings crossed ethical boundaries.
"It is unethical to be giving students a monetary incentive to do better on a standardized test," he said. "A university's main objective should be to better their students, not to use their students to better the university's image and reputation."
The use of financial incentives to encourage students to take a test is an obvious form of bribery, said Kelsey Cardwell, a sophomore in the School of Communication.
Accepted students taking the test in June, before they enter college in the fall, are at a completely different mindset both mentally and academically than they were when the test was first taken. She said she feels this could perhaps be an unfair competitive advantage.
Lori Scott-Fogelman, director of media relations at Baylor, defended the intentions of this policy. He said the policy came as a result of the advanced admissions deadlines that faced the enrolled freshman class last year.
The policy was intended to distribute financial aid after the university realized the expected amount of scholarship money was much higher than the amount awarded to the current freshman class, he said.
"Our intent was to encourage students to take a test that would then allow them access to financial aid money that we thought they were entitled to," Scott-Fogelman said. "We disagree with some of the comments that have been made by the media, including that we were doing this in an effort to increase our ranking in U.S.News and World Report. That is simply not true."
While this may not have been the intention, the average SAT score of Baylor University's freshman class was 1210 - an increase from Baylor University's last recorded average score of 1200, the Times reported. The increase in score is a factor utilized in ranking colleges for publications like the U.S.News and World Report.
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