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Here in Ontario we recently introduced a standardized "literacy test." I was among the first year of students to write that test, and I can vouch for the questions being painfully easy (e.g. a story says there are two people in the front of the canoe and four in the back, and a comprehension questions asks how many people were in the canoe). The only reason there was an initially high fail rate reported was because we were automatically failed if we "defaced" our papers or used profanity, which most of us did. No, not because we weren't articulate enough to avoid it, but because we were frustrated with the new curriculum and the amazingly poor initialization of it. But I'll not rant about that.
My point is that standardized tests are simple to anyone with a basic education, and students shouldn't be allowed to graduate without that. That 30,000 students can't find China on a map or the third side of a triangle is unfortunate, but we can't pretend these people will be ready for any careers other than fast food, retail, and politics.
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