Who could possibly have thought that it was a good idea? It makes absolutely no sense.
Kids are failing? Lower the bar! Suddenly everyone has "improved". The bureaucrats are happy, the unions are happy, even the parents who don't care about education are happy!
Makes it easier to push for the next part of the bureaucrat's agenda [0] [1] : CRT laced math and computer science education.
[0] https://equitablemath.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2020/11...
but people should have the chance of being taught these things, or indeed anything. to deny them of this is flatly wrong.