From an Edutopia reader comes this question: "With so many of today's schools focused on state achievement tests, many teachers are 'teaching to the test.' However, this does not adequately prepare students for life outside of school. Does anyone have any suggestions for the alternate assessment that this article was describing? I am looking for some way to increase student learning while maintaining state standards at the same time."

Every once in a while, a contrarian appears and challenges some of our basic assumptions about schooling in today's society. One of the biggest assumptions we have is that it is the job of school to prepare all our students for college.

Someone commenting on my last blog entry posed the following provocative question: "To really make a lasting difference, I think it will require that educators -- with or without unions -- put pressure on politicians and advocate for students and schools. Where do we start learning to be political?"

This is the second post in a two-part entry. Read part one.

One of my colleagues on the Teacher Leaders Network recently mused, "Have we abdicated our ability to speak for ourselves and to react? It's why I think policy makers may not listen to us. We have long relied on our unions to speak for us."

There is a lot of debate among educators about the lack of status for the teaching profession. A blogger named Matt Johnston has pointed out that if we teachers want to be treated as professionals, we can do something about it. We have the numbers and organization. If we have the will, we ought to stop griping and step up to make the changes we desire.

This is my third blog post here at Edutopia.org, so maybe it is time to introduce myself in the actual style of a blog and explain a bit about what my goals are in doing this.

Recently, consultants who were reviewing the data systems the California Department of Education uses to track student performance interviewed me. I have had to wrestle with how I feel about the whole process, because unfortunately, I think the emphasis on data has not been the boon to students and educators that was promised.

This is the second part of a two-part entry. Read part one.

In many of our schools, we have stopped giving our students real creative challenges because there is not enough time for anything open ended. Open-ended projects, by their very design, allow students to explore a wide variety of interests, concepts, and skills. That means we can't easily assess these projects with a multiple-choice test; therefore, schools suffer when they pursue them.

Creative play on the part of young children may be far more valuable than anyone has realized. I caught a fascinating story about this issue on NPR last week.