Bag&block or how to turn lego into jewellery

A few days ago, while I was scrolling through Instagram, I came across a news item about some special bags. They were made with lego pieces! And not only that, the people who made them were special people who I am more than sure have more than a few of the necessary competences to be part of our P.E. community.

This is the Bag&Block brand, which started more than 20 years ago in France.

BAG&BLOCK’s goal is to involve as many people with severe and long-term mental illnesses as possible in the different production processes of our bags; to this end, we collaborate with organisations that guide this group in developing a professional career that will help them in their integration into society.

The team behind this idea is Fundación Intras and Salud Mental Zamora. This Foundation is a non-profit organisation created in 1994. It has a team of almost 600 professionals, who accompany people with mental health problems in the recovery of their life projects. They offer different professional services to meet their needs. They work in 6 provinces of Castilla y León (Valladolid, Zamora, Salamanca, Burgos, Palencia and Ávila), in Madrid and in a network with entities all over Europe through the development of projects.

One of the products made by people with mental health problems is a type of bag that is sustainable, resistant, very original and handmade with a lot of patience. To make them, they first create a flexible and resistant framework with lego blocks, then they place the metal pieces and, finally, they join the sides with threads and place the inner lining. One of Bag&Block’s objectives is to create bags with a different type of material to what we are used to, and to propose a new concept of personalisation where each customer can give free rein to their creativity by changing their bag whenever they wish.

You have to know that nowadays the production of a bag takes an average of five hours of work and that when they started to produce, back in 2006, the average number of hours was 40. Since then, many tests, prototypes and improvements have been carried out until reaching what we can acquire today, quality, sustainability, originality and comfort.

The technique of producing bags is safe for the people who make them and is also a way of keeping them busy while helping them to keep their psychomotor system active.

There are many models, just have a look here or here, and even almost from scratch to make your favourite model, just enter here and here, and get your imagination going. Also, you should know that the Bag&Block bags allow you to put on and take off lego blocks so you can adapt the bag to whatever you are wearing at the time and give free rein to your creativity. Oh, and the pieces are also compatible with Megablock and other standard brands.

If you want more information, I invite you to visit their website, their Instagram account or their facebook account.

By the way, it’s already April and Easter is just around the corner.

Cows can fly

Last March 2024, the ZUR_EKIN project (which means “with you” in Basque) was presented in the auditorium of the Bilbao campus of the University of Deusto (UD). It is a mentoring program aimed at accompanying and developing gifted students in Secondary Education and Baccalaureate, in which professors from different faculties of the UD (Law, Engineering, Deusto Business School, Education and Sports, Social and Human Sciences) mentor the students.

It is run and managed by the Unit of Support for the Development of High Intellectual Abilities, which is part of the Faculty of Education and Sport of the UD, in collaboration with the Department of Education of the Basque Government. My “good luck” this year, among others, has been to have the privilege of being part of this Unit (in which we have worked, and a lot). Although I have not been in direct contact with the students and teachers of the project, as a Unit, we have developed several lines and tasks of research that we consider very necessary to provide a quality educational response to this type of students.

In this first edition of the pioneer project in the Basque Autonomous Community, around thirty students from different schools have participated. On June 12, 2024 they presented, in a closing session of this edition, the projects they have carried out accompanied by their mentors.

Unfortunately, I could not attend the first part of the event, but I was able to enjoy many of the presentations made by the students in the second part, as well as the round table in which students and teachers participated.

It is great that, finally, visibility is given and work is being done for and with this type of students!

We know that there are things to improve, because nobody is perfect, but today I want to focus on the positive aspects of the June 12 session (we will leave the improvements to work on them). This time, this post is for the gifted students. Their presentations have been very diverse, from projects based on cows that can fly or cows that listen to music to produce better quality milk, to entrepreneurial projects based on the interests of young people or companies that bet on social economy and integrated social value.

I would like to highlight some of the characteristics of this group of young people, who have had the courage to face an audience of students, teachers and families who are very proud of them and the opportunity they have seized:

  • Involvement
  • Effort
  • Collaboration
  • Peer learning
  • Listening
  • Trust
  • Very positive attitude
  • Appreciation
  • Desire for more (to know, to learn, to work, to learn about new topics)
  • Extra-curiosity
  • Enjoyment
  • Ability to communicate orally
  • Desire for freedom of expression and to ask questions to learn

The challenges they have worked on, besides satisfying many of their varied interests, have opened their minds even more, have allowed them to open up to new possibilities in an uncertain future for some of them, and have allowed them to demonstrate that they are very capable of solving problems in a creative way and even using totally unknown tools that, at the beginning, are used in very advanced educational courses compared to the ones they are in right now.

Congratulations for your achievements and thank you for teaching us. I am sure that what you showed us a few days ago is only the beginning of your path to success.

Enjoy July.

Entrepreneurship on Thursdays

it is true. I haven’t written for some weeks now, with the summer in between, but, this time, with more than enough reason not to do it. I admit that writing about entrepreneurship and entrepreneurs is one of the “things” that I am most proud of.

These days I have met soooo many entrepreneurs: former participants of the Ingenio program (there they are, demonstrating their talents); people who are starting their businesses (with dreams that are starting to come true); people who are taking a somersault at a decisive moment in their lives and who have decided to do it NOW (they are not lacking in courage); people responsible for very beautiful and successful entrepreneurial projects; entrepreneurs who, at last, are starting their businesses (with dreams that are starting to come true); entrepreneurs who, at last, are beginning to reap their fruits (they have been taking care of and observing their “proposals” with great affection); in short, many entrepreneurs who, every time I saw them, reminded me how much can be done and achieved if we make an effort and fight for it. (more…)

Dispelling the myth about social entrepreneurhsip

Today’s post was not this one, but I admit that, by chance, while I was looking for information for “the post I was writing”, I came across a video that I liked. It could not be otherwise, I confess. I have a special affection for Ashoka. The video I am sharing with you today seems very clear and direct.

What do I like about this video? Above all, I like the fact that Maite Arango y Alexandra Mitjans, two women from different generations of Ashoka, talk about social entrepreneurship. Among the keywords of their conversation, I share with you the following:

  • Work
  • Challenges
  • Solutions
  • Innovation
  • Initiatives
  • Impacts
  • Contribution
  • Legacy
  • Technology
  • Humanity
  • Ethic
  • Education
  • Awareness
  • Commitment
  • Empathy
  • Sustainability
  • Conviction
  • Collaboration (intergenerational, institutional, organizational, corporate, global, international, etc.)

¿What is your main option? Difficult, right?

Thanks, Ashoka, for your daily work.

I will be back in two weeks. Enjoy June.