Here in Florida we has FCAT tests that students must pass in order to graduate middle school and then High School. It was instituted back in the 90’s when my daughter was in middle school. I told one of her teachers then that what would happen is the teachers would wind up teaching the tests in order to get their own evals up. That’s exactly what has happened..........
As an added benefit, it also had the effect of cutting all electives including vocational courses.
The state rewarded schools that had an improvement in pass rates yearly with their share of federal funding for the next year. It all sounds noble except 3/4 of our students were ESL immigrants that left after 100 days but before the school year was over. They all failed the AIMS test (mostly by being no-shows) then left to become a burden on kalifornia districts for the rest of the year.