The reminders are everywhere. Some are writ large (“Richey 4Ever” sharpied in the girls’ toilets in the art block), some seep back slowly (the smell of cheesy beans wafting from the canteen) and some creep up (a parent’s face coming in to focus as you recall them as a short-lived, but heavily diarised, boyfriend from spring 1989).

You see, when you’re a teacher in the school where you were a student, you can’t hide from your past.

I was not one of the immediate “returners”. It was 13 years before I stepped into the classrooms that I was taught in and stood at the front to do the teaching. But I have stayed. I am (so far) a permanent returner.

Though no official figures exist, the phenomenon of returners appears widespread. Minutes after posting an appeal for returner stories on social media, I was inundated.

In my own school there are almost 20 of us, including support staff, curriculum leaders, teachers, canteen staff, and cleaners.

What binds us is a love of the school. And a love of the school is an undeniably positive attribute - we are emotionally invested in the place more so than any other.

But is it all positive? Below are three things for prospective returners to consider and three things for whoever is doing the recruiting to bear in mind.

For the returner

1. Imposter syndrome

An inability to address one’s former teachers by their first names is the ubiquitous anecdote among returners. Throughout my first year, I experienced imposter syndrome every time I walked into the staff room or up a one-way corridor the wrong way. Even today, a decade on, there are some members of staff who will forever be “Sir” and never “Ian”.

But this feeling of being an imposter does pass, and far from being treated an interloper, you are welcomed in and trusted quickly. One returner I spoke with notes that he seemed to be offered responsibilities much earlier in his career than other staff - his loyalty implicit in his return.

2. Eternal adolescence

It doesn’t always work out well if you get over the imposter syndrome, though: eternal adolescence can be bestowed upon you. I have now spent twice as many years at my school as an actual grown-up teacher as I did as a student, but to some staff I will forever be a teenager. Building professional relationships with colleagues becomes somewhat more complicated when your last encounter with them involved the confiscation of your ear cuff. (In my defence, fashion police, it was the early 1990s.) One returner even suggests that this perception of them as a former student has held them back from making the move to a more senior role. Are some staff happy having one of their ex-students as a teacher but not as a leader?

3. Blasts from the past

But the real gutpunch link to your past is the parents. You teach the children of the children you went to school with and hung out with ... out of school. Beware parents’ evenings that begin: “Hello, Mrs Elliott, remember when...?”

Such occasions require a healthy dose of amnesia. It can be embarrassing but look on the positive side: you know these families well, and they you: the home-school trust that can be so difficult to build is often already in place.

For the school

1. Alumni

Raising aspirations via alumni stories is so much easier with a returner. In one assembly showcasing a range of talented people at the top of their respective fields - actors, comedians, charity directors, IT managers, medical research CEOs with penthouses in Manhattan - I asked the assembled throng, what do all these people have in common? The answer, revealed via grainy old school photos: they were all in Mrs Elliott’s year. They went to this school. Like you. They all know where Springy Chicken Park is. Like you. And they have all gone down the woods and jumped into Green Pool on a hot summer’s day. Like you. The sense of endless future possibilities was palpable.

2. Marketing

For me, attracting returners back into the fold is a clear indicator of a “good” school. Firstly, the school has enabled ex-students to achieve a decent(ish) degree; secondly, it proves that its teachers have inspired students to teach. As one returner says, “I think it is the best possible marketing for a school - we loved it so much we came back here”.

3. Knowing the context

Returners know the school, and its community. They understand that the funny smell in the air some mornings is the chewing gum factory changing its flavour, not a mint-scented chemical attack as the Year 9 gossips would have you believe. That is a huge benefit in building relationships that are so crucial for learning.

In the last week of term, we welcomed our newest returner to the fold: a recent school leaver embarking on a LSA apprenticeship. Their return was met with wholehearted applause in the staff briefing. But there’s no way he’s calling me Nina - not just yet.

Nina Elliott is head of MFL at Tor Bridge High in Plymouth, Devon