We are so happy to welcome Allison Ewing to the Upper School as the new Assistant Principal for Grades 9 & 10. Despite only starting at WIS two months ago, Ms. Ewing says she felt at home right away: “I feel like I’ve been working here for the last ten years. It’s a really great feeling. I want to shout it from the rooftops how amazing WIS is. I’m all in!”

Though she spent much of her childhood in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Ms. Ewing attended the American International School in Florence, Italy for Grade 2, and that experience has always stayed with her. She has taught social studies in several parts of the United States, including a few years at the American Boychoir School in Princeton, New Jersey, where she would go on tour with the students for weeks at a time as their teacher and chaperone as they traveled around the country. She says, “I have taught on ferry boats, planes, trains, subways, airport waiting areas - you name it!” 

Ms. Ewing comes to WIS after six years at Bullis School in Potomac, Maryland, where she served as the Upper School Social Studies Department Chair and Co-Director of Equity, Inclusion, and Justice. WIS is not new to her, however; many of her students at Bullis would attend the WIS GIN Conference each year, and the schools would compete against each other at It’s Academic! tournaments. She also met many WIS teachers at various professional development conferences over the years. Ms. Ewing was always impressed with the WIS students that she met, so she jumped at the opportunity to work with them this year.

As the Assistant Principal for Grades 9 &10, Ms. Ewing is in charge of students' schedules and working with the youngest Upper School students, but she is also in charge of the Upper School Advisory Program. She works closely with the administrators, faculty, and students in order to bring the community together, something that is even more important during this time of distance learning. She says, “we’ve worked on tweaking the advisory program to make it more intentional in our new digital space. Building connections is even more important these days. My new working mantra is ‘How do we get beyond the Zoom?’ Having a new schedule where we deliberately carved out community time for assemblies, advisory, and flex time will hopefully help the students and teachers maintain their sense of togetherness.” Ms. Ewing also works closely with ISU and club leaders to ensure their success throughout the year. Lastly - but certainly not least - “I’m also keeping an eye on student well being, to ensure there is balance between academics and extracurricular/home life.” It’s more challenging these days, for sure, but she is up to the task!

Ms. Ewing also hopes to share her past work on diversity, equity, and inclusion to the WIS community. As a person of color who attended predominantly white institutions, Ms. Ewing “knew I didn’t belong, but I didn’t know why. That’s a hard thing for a kid to articulate.” She became more involved in DEI work in college at the University of Michigan, when she worked as an RA in the dorms and took a class about the psychology of getting people of diverse backgrounds to live with each other and function well together. Over time, she came to realize that “more often than not, you get more traction by not being the voice in the room but by being the listener in the room. I will speak up when I need to, but oftentimes in this work, people want you to listen to them. That’s really important. They want to feel that you see them, that you hear them, and that you value them. Nine times out of ten, when there is a tension in the room, or a misunderstanding, or a disconnect, it oftentimes boils down to that.”

“I got involved in DEI work at Bullis when I became Social Studies Department Chair, and I realized that I could have more influence over curriculum. I proposed and created an African American history class: what would it sound like if we learned history not only from the perspective of the dominant culture, but also from the perspective of those who have been oppressed? Much of the work that I’ve done around curriculum is how to make it more culturally responsive. I’ve also taught workshops on this topic, and I was able to integrate this work into the Bullis advisory program as well.”

“The message I try to send about DEI work is that it’s accessible for everyone. We are all at different places and comfort levels, and that’s okay. You don’t have to be an expert to do it; you don’t have to have years of special training, you don’t have to have a title behind your name to do this work, and to call out inequity and injustice. You have something to bring to the table. And we want you at the table. We want you to be seen, to be valued, and to be heard at the table." 

“Also, we’re going to make mistakes. We’re all works-in-progress, and we’re all working on it. It’s important to give ourselves a lot of patience and grace, but to keep working. When we know better, we do better. I do this work because I have two kids, and if I’m not doing this work, then I don’t know who else will do it on their behalf.”

As she has started to settle in to the new school year, Ms. Ewing is really looking forward to getting to know the student body better. So far, she has seen that “the students are inquisitive; they are thoughtful; they are thoroughly kind. They always ask how I am doing. I think everyone should know just how much genuine concern and care people have for each other at WIS. That makes it the place that it is. The students know and feel that - that’s my hope. Helping them get that feeling ‘beyond the Zoom’ is my challenge for this year.”