Ewing brings British perspective to global studies and history classes

By Ani Eagan
​Having come to the U.S. only a few years ago from the UK, with an interest in history and museums, Hannah Ewing now teaches global studies along with other subjects, to upper school students.
     After doing an internship on museum education while she was getting her master’s degree in Material Culture and Public Humanities at Virginia Tech, (having got her initial degree in Archaeology at University College London), Ewing realized the part she liked about the experience was the interaction with the students, and getting to teach them.
    “It felt like kind of the natural next step for me,” Ewing said.
    The internship she did for museum education shows her love for museums, her favorite being the Pitt Rivers Museum which connects to the Museum of Natural History in Oxford.
“It’s just so disorganized that it’s fantastic,” she said. 
    The museum has all kinds of archaeological and ethnographic artifacts and was originally started by a founding gift from General Pitt Rivers of over 26,000 objects, though the collection has now grown to over a million. It has things such as samurai suits and even used to have shrunken heads.
 If she wasn’t working as a teacher she’d like to be in a museum doing museum education or exhibition curation.
“I could spend my life in museums,” Ewing said with a smile.
She teaches a couple subjects such as Global Studies, U.S. History and even History of Religion as an elective this trimester. She sees the importance of teaching global studies as she thinks it's important for students to have an understanding of the world they live in at a young age, so they can become people who are open and educated about the world they live in. 
Ewing was born in Scotland, but raised in a small town near Oxford. She considers herself British, not English.
“I think it's so important to developing global people, as we all are.”
Ewing also says she enjoys teaching the ninth grade as she and them both are new to the high school, so she gets to grow with them.
    She also teaches an elective on religion. “The elective is just a project of my soul, I just find that topic fascinating.” 
    “She is a very good teacher,” one of Ewing’s ninth-grade students said when asked about her class. “The activities we do in class are fun and keep us interested in the topic.”
    Outside of teaching and her interest in museums, Ewing also likes the outdoors and occasionally goes backpacking. She and her family even have blow-up canoes that they use to go on the river together. She is also currently planning her wedding, for which she has unique ideas.
    “Trying to convince my fiance that we need like a thousand disco balls,” Ewing said with a chuckle.
    Ewing met Dr. Naginey in 2018 in Oxford. They plan to be married at Corpus Christi College, Oxford with the reception in the Museum of Natural History in July 2022.
    Dr. Naginey thinks the museum’s fossils will be decorative enough, Ewing said.
    While she is still new to North Cross, Ewing’s students talk positively about Ewing and her class. She feels the same about them. 
“My favorite thing about teaching is just talking to the students,” Ewing said. “It’s so fun just being around people who have such like an… excitement.”