Sarah was very much right to NOT be involved with this mess.
One of the problems with such a national standard is who writes the standard? Far Left leaning people with an agenda!
The far lefties write the curriculum in many states so even if you live in a conservative area, your kids are learning about having two daddies or two mommies, the important founders of our country (excluding all those dead white guys though!), etc, etc, etc.
This would be more of the same at the national level - so states that DON’T follow the leftists agenda get pilloried for their poor scores.
How do you compare a child who lives in the Y-K delta and speaks Y’upik (as a primary language) to a ghetto rat from Liberty City FL? Short answer - you can't. Period. Dot.
There is no National Education Standard that can be written that can cover such a vast differences in culture, ethnicity and regional (dialect, associations, etc, etc) - it's pipe dream of control freaks.
National literacy standards, yes. Minimum math skills, maybe. There is no universal solvent.