Under House Speaker Tom Feeney's newest plan, Bright Futures scholars will be rewarded for testing out of basic classes not with a better education but a shorter one.

Another testing boondoggle is brewing in Tallahassee, to the probable disadvantage and dismay of college students whose Bright Futures tuition scholarships would be shortened.

First, some history. Last year, House Speaker Tom Feeney, ignoring his committees, had the law changed to require scholarship holders in the state universities and junior colleges to take five examinations, known as CLEP tests, that could allow them to skip basic courses, get credit for them and finish college faster. The same stricture applied to students who had already passed equivalent advanced placement (AP) or International Baccalaureate examinations in high school. State universities and community colleges would be required to grant the credits.

The institutions, which weren't consulted, were ordered to pay for the CLEP tests. For each test passed, or course exempted, the student's total scholarships would be reduced accordingly.

The enormity of that mistake was obvious on its face: It would curtail the college careers of Florida's brightest students, depriving them of electives that could enrich them personally and professionally. Once again, politicians who could not possibly pass as pedagogues were meddling with the curriculum. Moreover, there was no incentive for students to want to pass the tests. Nearly all who cared to skip college basics would have already taken the AP tests in high school.

Now, Feeney is pushing new legislation that purports to solve some of the problems but makes the whole mess worse. It requires students to take the tests before receiving their Bright Futures scholarships, extends the testing requirement to students attending nonpublic colleges and to Gold Seal Vocational Scholars who had been exempt, grants a $50 bonus for every test the students pass, makes the Department of Education instead of the individual universities responsible for the testing program, and charges the as-yet-unknown cost to the public schools.

Also, students would no longer have their scholarships shortened for passing the tests. Instead, everyone's eligibility would be cut approximately 10 percent. Bright Futures, which is funded with lottery dollars, would pay for no more than the minimum number of credit hours, (at the universities, usually 120) needed to graduate. The assumption seems to be that students who passed the tests would choose to graduate even earlier.

A curious provision in the bill requires the department to "contract for centralized administrative services," including a Web site for registration, test preparation, study guides and practice tests, and all record-keeping. When legislation requires the state to outsource a new program, it's usually with a specific vendor in mind.

On the plus side -- perhaps -- the bill allows the department to contract for alternatives to the College Board's CLEP test. Here also, it remains to be seen whether any specific competitors are intended.

But overall, the new legislation compounds last year's mistake. An early, unofficial estimate pegs the cost at nearly $9-million, yet another drain that the public schools can ill afford. Rep. Marco Rubio, R-Coral Gables, who's sponsoring the bill for Feeney, concedes there is a problem with that funding source. Finding another won't necessarily mean that the money is well spent.

It is particularly questionable to be requiring vocational students to take the tests, which are oriented to an academic curriculum.

Fiddling with the details doesn't cure what was wrong from the start. By all means, students who are willing and able to skip basic courses in English, science, mathematics, social studies and humanities should be encouraged to do so. But the reward for succeeding should be a better college education, not a shorter one. Is Florida that cheap?

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