Eighty children crossed the threshold of the Ordan Mihajloski-Ocka music school in Prilep for the 2026/2027 school year. A number that, at a time when everyone is talking about empty classrooms and emigration, sounds almost impossible.

Mayor Dejan Prodanoski attended the welcome ceremony and read the figure as a sign of growing interest in music education. One thing is certain - 80 new pupils do not simply appear out of nowhere in a town that has been fighting demographics for decades.

"The Municipality of Prilep is proud of its music school, a place where young talents have been discovered, encouraged and developed for years," Prodanoski said, thanking the teaching staff and the management.

He also stressed that local government has an obligation to support children, teachers and schools, and to create the conditions for quality education. "Music teaches children discipline, it encourages their creativity and self-confidence," the mayor added.

It is worth pausing here on something that gets said less often. A music school is one of the few institutions that carries no political marking - nobody there looks at who is with whom, only at who put in the practice. If Prilep enrolled 80 new pupils this year, then the town still has families who believe it is worth a child spending afternoons with an instrument instead of a screen.

The questions no ceremony answers remain: does the school have enough instruments, does it have teachers for all of them, and in four years will anyone ask how many of those 80 stayed. That is when we will find out whether the number was a beginning or just a good day for a photograph.