But a standardized test assumes that a certain percentage will fail. Its the same reason why aberrations like "Stack Ranking" are just as evil.
"What? All my people are excellent on my team, yet I have to rank a number of them as 1's (a number of 1-bad, 2-neutral, and 3-awesome). I have no choice..." - Stack ranking in a nutshell.
You could be an a school that 99% have the intelligence to pass. But yet, some bureaucrat says that a certain number has to fail, no matter what.
Compare that to a Drivers License test, where we test on if you know that material to drive. There is no required minimum number of people who fail, nor is there a comparison to others. It's you and a minimum test passing rate.
This is an intersting quote, because I had to take a test to get my license.