a quiet as a church mouse

School with no pupils. It’s a strange, wonderful place. The corridors are empty, there are no PE bags hanging in the cloakrooms. Everything is eerily quiet.

In Church we have it drummed into us that a Church is not a building – that it is a collective of people meeting in God’s name.

Well a school is not a building either – and it’s not a work place (although it certainly feels that way usually) – it’s a group of people meeting to learn. The building, and the teachers, are just there to facilitate that learning.
Across the country teachers are returning to their classrooms a week before their pupils. They are preparing for the year ahead, doing a spot of classroom decoration, discussing action and development plans, deciding focuses for PRSD, welcoming new members of staff, enduring INSET…

This is a strange strange place when it’s quiet. It feels somehow wrong. Something’s missing. Without the pupils it has a dormant feel – an empty, hollow, shell of a building. A church without people is just a building – but it can be one impressive building; architecturally, aesthetically. An old empty church building has to be the single most emotive space possible . A school without pupils is just a collection of empty rooms and corridors – and I love it.