Finding Beauty in Uniqueness: A Reflection

Loni Bergqvist

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This little vase has changed my world.

Most normal vases are meant to hold a bunch of flowers. A bouquet with flowers that look good together, and complement each other in colour and shape.

Our schools are a lot like traditional vases: serving bunches of kids that are pretty much the same.

But this vase?

It was a fancy designer gift from our kitchen company as an apology for a cabinet door that took a whole year to be installed. When I opened the box, I thought it was a toothbrush holder.

Small holes, a place for each individual stem.

The vase itself is not revolutionary.

But I’ve noticed a beautiful thing when I go into our garden and pick plants to fill it. I’m not looking for the huge volume of flowers anymore.

I’m looking for the individual flowers

The unknown weed alongside the house that looks like a green version of wheat.

The daisy in the back next to the trampoline.

A couple of sprigs of lavender that my new plants could spare.

A barely opened pink flower that still needs time.

And a few random weeds with splashes of purple and yellow.

My trips to the garden are now focused on seeing the beauty and uniqueness in everything sprouting from the ground. Not because it needs to fit together, but because now it has a place to stand alone.

Surprisingly, no matter what combination of flowers I choose, they all look stunning together.

Our schools need to be this.

Our kids are the wheat, daisies, lavender, unopened pink-flower and random collection of weeds.

Look, we can’t wait for the system to design this for us. The larger system will likely forever be stuck in the big-normal-vase thinking.

Those who know me will know my solution is Project-Based Learning. It’s something we have the possibility to do every day in our classrooms… if we have the courage to do something different.

What vase will you fill today?   

Loni was (and always will be) a teacher. She became a Project-Based Learning ‘convert’ when she started attending night school in Leadership at the High Tech High Graduate School of Education. Loni left her school to teach at High Tech High, knowing one day her mission would be to bring Project-Based Learning to students who needed it the most; the ones who were in traditional schools. Since 2014, Loni has been working with schools around the world to re-imagine education. She is the founder of Imagine If.

Professional Prompts

1. The central metaphor in Loni’s piece has a lot of How can we change our school to allow all student to thrive? At Gesher School, one of our maxims is“every younge person profoundly well known—and knowing that they are known”.
2. Think of your own How does your school recognise and show the skills, abilities, beliefs and interests of each child? How might you re-think yourteaching to make a place for each one of them?