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Motivated by neoliberal economic priorities and under global education governance, students' test scores are the preferred evidence of education quality. Chasing 'world class' education quality, a southern Australian education department is seeking to improve 'falling standards' with their policy text: Toward 2028: Department for Education Strategic Plan. Significantly, the strategy includes improvement planning with mandatory formats and targets, evidence-based approaches and expert support and a focus on data from standardised assessments to determine whether outcomes have improved. Examining whether these approaches will improve the state's learning outcomes, or are folly, critical policy sociology is employed, specifically policy analysis using Bacchi's: What's the problem represented to be? approach. The department for education's strategic plan is interrogated, underscoring global themes: challenges to equity, reductive effects of test-based accountability, and the implications and impacts on teachers. The analysis identifies deep engagement in global discourses and calls for a shift away from what is a source of global inequities rather than the solution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]