I am in agreement with you that group work is overdone. The flavor-of-the-day thinking was to model the workplace where collaboration is the key. This is a 90's baby and individual achievement and accountability has fallen because of it and too many teachers will give the same grade to all members the group. Collaborative work is important, but my students know that I'm watching, looking, and listening and that there will rarely be identical grades. It is a cheat for lazy teachers in my opinion, and will be taken advantage of.
The fact that these fads come and go is exactly WHY parents and consumers of public education "can't keep their noses out of it" TyBrad --my wife and I have repeatably BOTH been asked by friends to tutor their high school kids in math and try to overcome the damage that has been done with "new math" and "estimation math" and "14 ways to multiply" math. Scholarly intentions can ruin a decade full of students who were never taught the ONE WAY to multiply that always works!! I'm seen modern math techniques turn bright students in weeping intimidated hulks. Because the teacher would admonish them with crap like "i told you to estimate to 3 digits even if the third is the fractional part of 20.5 Billion!! (Duhhhh -- how many digits is that? What problem was I solving here?) 
I do not resist some sort of public accountability, but there are a few things to consider.
1. Do it so that the analysis is not stilted for anyone or anything but student gain. There are way too many adult agendas going on so that this is not really achievable.
Yup!
2. It can never be fair to everyone. Different cultures, different preparations, different out-of-school support structures, etc. That's the art of trying to write a test. And which subjects? Why Biology and not Chemistry? Why Algebra? Most will never use it again in their lifetime for christ's sake.
I think because the expectation is that students will achieve a uniform MINIMUM proficiency in K-12 for Reading, Writing, Math, and Social Studies. That's the customer expectation. If this doesn't match the goals set by the curriculum and teachers -- it ought to openly discussed and the expectation needs to be adjusted. I never had a reason to appreciate early English Lit or Art History or any number of "squirm thru" classes in High School.
Cultures? Preparations? Doesn't apply to the NAEP-type tests. If you're telling me that it has to presented in Ghetto-American English, I don't buy that. If the kids are not proficient in English because of a 2nd language, make a note on the result. The fact that they can't tell us which European country came to our aid in the Revolutionary War (multiple choice) is a problem that transcends all that.
3. Set it up by educators who have been teaching and managing in a current generation's classroom- not one from 20 years in their past, if even at all. Politicians and most administrators- keep your noses out of it! You have no grounding in reality. This is tried, but then political harpies and barrister-types swoop in so that the implementation is sloppy, not well thought-out, and will not stand the test of time. The perfect example is NCLB; a decades old idea that politicians and lawyers began fiddling with. Who doesn't want an NCLB idea to work? But it can't. What you end up with is band aids, open sores, redundancy, work-arounds, taken over schools (with what remedial result?), resentment and apathy. When you are told that you cannot do your job without outsiders controlling the marionette, it just follows- regardless of profession. And why ANYONE would want to enter into special education is beyond me!
I'm in the stupid position of DEFENDING a Fed National Standards test. If you've read any of my views on Federalism on this board, you must know how pained I am to do that!! On one level -- there's the gimmicks and marketing that we agree should go away. But at the next level, there is the "standard" curriculum that obviously serves a purpose to qualify a High School diploma as meaningful and certify that the kids are ready to be molded and injected with College content. While there are political battles on the MICRO scale over curriculum content, the MACRO scale that the NAEP should measure are pretty much undisputed. (correct me if I'm wrong here and also correct the expectations of the parents and taxpayers)
When the states alone were determining standard content -- they were already cooking the accountibility books and getting dismal results. That gave Jabba the Fed the excuse to sit on them with it's gynormous 12% funding contribution. And we're STILL arguing about "standard curriculum" and expectations. And we STILL don't have relief for the parents who care.
PS: I've even heard professional educators whine about the fact that PRIVATE schools aren't required to participate in NAEP or NCLB. It either IS useful and perhaps consumers should DEMAND the same accountibility from Private schools -- or it isn't.. Private schools don't have the same accountibility problems as the public schools do because there is choice and contracts involved. And misrepresenting student performance is generally not tolerated. (that's likely to heat your collar -- but that's the common customer viewpoint)
I'll tell ya; people better stop playing the one-upsmanship/dominance game that goes on with education and educators. There is a content shortage as it is in some areas, and pre-service students see all of the hours, agendas, legalities, nonsense, and pittance of a pay scale. It's just not worth the hassle for many potentially great ones who either never enter, or are out within 3 yrs. Then what? There is no other profession that ends up with a lower hourly pay than there is in K-12. But the populace knows better. They ALWAYS know better, no?
This is in NO way condoning the cheating scandals that go on around the country, and there does need to be criminal pursuits taken in Atlanta. But that still does nothing for your youtube mother.