Tighten SAT security across the U.S.

On Tuesday the State Senate's higher education committee, headed by Kenneth P. LaValle (R-Port Jefferson), will meet in Albany to discuss a hot topic: cheating on the SATs. The question before the committee is whether legislation to increase security for the tests should include tougher criminal punishment for cheaters. The answer is that security should be tighter and penalties should be tougher, although they needn't be criminal. Nassau District Attorney Kathleen Rice has suggested that test-takers be photographed, for example. Students who send in impersonators could be barred from the SATs for a year, and colleges should be told of their cheating.

Best of all would be a national approach to a problem that surely goes beyond New York. Washington is probably a better place to address it than Albany.