Sam Merriam is a rising junior at Middlebury College, where he is majoring in International Politics and Economics with a language concentration in Spanish. He was first introduced to nonproliferation in a month-long class with CNS EANP Director Jeffrey Lewis, in which he researched North Korean weapons production facilities and learned the basics of open-source intelligence. For the spring semester of 2024, he was brought on to the CNS team, working with fellow undergraduates to conduct a variety of textual and imaging research on the DPRK, UAE, and Iran. Sam has also worked in various government positions at home in Rhode Island, researching policy and organizing large databases in collaboration with state agencies and corporations. He is looking forward to continuing his work with the CNS team through the summer and fall before studying abroad in Madrid in the spring of 2025. In his free time, Sam enjoys running, attempting to learn how to play the guitar, and planning trips that he will likely never go on.