I was not aware that California is now near the bottom although their funding issues are periodically in the news and they do have a disproportionate ESL population. I was thinking of other states whose curriculums with which I am familiar. Anyhow, I purposely did not want to call out and criticize any specific states.

I don't live in MA but in general, our children certainly would not get substantially dumber partly because they have educated parents with resources. Relatives/friends in some of these poor performing states send their kids to top prep schools and/or extra-curricular acceleration/enrichment opportunities. The high average(and below)ability kids with financially strapped and/or uninvolved parents probably would not fare as well.