Student Researchers Work Side-by-Side with Top Experts at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies

Each semester, dozens of students work as graduate research assistants at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies (CNS), the largest nongovernmental organization in the U.S. devoted exclusively to research and training on WMD nonproliferation.

Not Your Typical “Think Tank”

This research center operates differently from most major think tanks in the field, said Jessica Varnum, deputy director of CNS. 

“The typical think tank doesn’t have training and education as a central part of its mission,” Varnum said. “In this case, the largest think tank [on nonproliferation] is directly affiliated with a master’s program that trains students to become policy practitioners.”

Graduate research assistants work up to 20 hours weekly during the academic year, applying research, foreign language, and other classroom skills to real-world problems for foundations, donors, and the federal government. This grant-funded, on-the-job training means students work alongside leading practitioners in the nonproliferation field, contributing to news stories and public policy, and even participating in international diplomacy.

Opportunities in International Diplomacy

Students also have numerous opportunities to gain practical experience in international diplomacy, thanks to CNS’s close working relationships with international organizations and national delegations. 

According William Potter, founding director of CNS, 20 current and past CNS students and staff represented over a dozen national and international organizations at the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) Preparatory Committee meeting in Geneva in summer 2024. Current students Grecia Sedano and Eli Horton participated formally as members of the delegations of Mexico and the UN Office of Disarmament Affairs, respectively.  

CNS also places selected students in professional internships at international organizations for up to six months, where interns work alongside the permanent staff of these organizations and are treated as if they are junior staff. Recent placements have included the United Nations Offices for Disarmament Affairs in New York, Geneva, and Vienna; the Organization for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Latin America and the Caribbean (OPANAL)  in Mexico City; and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons in the Hague. Many of the students acquire the skills necessary to function as young professionals at these organizations through their participation in a very realistic, semester-long arms control negotiation simulations conducted by Dr. Potter and Mr. Jean du Preez.

Working at the Intersection of Trade and Diplomacy

Graduate research assistants supporting CNS’s Export Control and Nonproliferation Program have also worked with the private sector to improve efforts to detect illicit diversion of proliferation-relevant technologies. In a collaboration with Women in International Trade Northern California (WIT-NC) arranged by the program’s director, Robert Shaw, GRA’s Mahnoor Abbasi MANPTS ’23, Samir Belkacem MANPTS ’24, and Jack Crowell MANPTS ’24 developed hypothetical scenarios of diversion for interactive exercises at a November 2023 industry workshop on due diligence best practices in export control. The graduate research assistants moderated the exercises at the workshop, which was held at Adobe Software’s headquarters in San Jose and attended by export and sanctions compliance practitioners from leading technology companies in Silicon Valley. Crowell and Belkacem both now work at SECURUS Strategic Trade Solutions.

“Working at CNS grounds you,” said Crowell. “It allows you to understand things as they are, rather than through a theoretical lens. Employers will ask for experience in the field beyond being a student. Having this experience makes it a lot easier to find a career.”

Learning the Ropes of Open-Source Intelligence

Graduate Research Assistants Get Paid to Learn

“It’s like getting paid to learn something new every day,” said Jenny Moss, who will graduate with her MA in Nonproliferation and Terrorism Studies in 2025.

Moss works on the New Tools Team, a group of researchers and graduate students working together to use open-source intelligence tools like social media, YouTube, and satellite images to establish a ground-level view of activity in missile and nuclear programs. The team is led by Professor Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at CNS. Thanks to corporate partnerships, students can access software and imagery that universities wouldn’t typically have.

“The world really sets what we’re going to do,” said Moss, who has worked on everything from Iranian missile debris to the North Korean nuclear program. “I’m surrounded by some of the  world’s leading experts on these technologies, and that’s pretty cool.”