Sam was born and raised in Southern California and grew up with sunny days on the beach and family trips to the mountains–neither of which were too far away from home. She stayed local during college as she attended UCLA and earned her B.A. in Psychology while doing research in cognitive neuroscience. Following graduation, Sam shifted her focus to the field of Speech Language Pathology and earned her B.S. in Communication Disorders & Sciences from Utah State University. The next stop was graduate school. Sam relocated to the Pacific Northwest and attended the University of Oregon, where she earned her M.S. in Communication Disorders & Sciences.n