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In the past few months, Maria Andrea Castro (MSF/IMBA ’05), has completed two degrees in the College of Business Administration and landed a new job. Along with several other students, she took advantage of the joint degree offerings in the Chapman Graduate School of Business, earning a Master of Science in Finance (MSF) and an International Master of Business Administration (IMBA) in a mere two years. “At the end of the IMBA, we had the opportunity to choose electives,” said Castro, who now is working for a start-up hedge fund that’s a new venture of GP Asset Management, LLC, a Miami-based company that advises high net worth families in Miami and Latin America. “When I started choosing, I was selecting courses in finance. I realized with one more elective I could get a banking certificate and with just six more courses I could get two degrees in two years.” Castro had earned her undergraduate degree from Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá, had studied at Indiana University of Pennsylvania as part of a study abroad, and had worked in Colombia for BP, as well as for a publishing company in Miami that targeted the Hispanic market. When she decided to go to graduate school, she said chose Florida International University over University of Miami for a number of reasons. “I felt it had better programs, I wanted to go full-time, I knew I could complete the IMBA very quickly, and I liked the international focus,” she said. “The joint degree was great because the staff coordinated everything and the two programs really complemented each other, with a number of synergies between them.” Having pursued the joint degree option helped pave the way for securing her job and for her long-term success, she said. “The MSF is the degree that definitely helped me get the job,” she said, “but having two degrees prepares me very well for doing the job. Finance alone is lots of numbers but with an MBA, I can connect those numbers with the real world and the IMBA in particular gives me the international dimension.”
With a job well in hand Camilo Paredes had different aims, aims that a joint degree in MS-MIS (Master of Science in Management Information Systems) and an MBA from the Evening MBA program (EVEMBA) is meeting. He will graduate in April, 2006. “I chose to get a graduate degree for professional development and self-improvement,” said Paredes, who currently is a senior manager in the Enterprise Solutions Group at Taxware in Miami. He also holds a Diploma in Finance from Instituto Tecnológico de Monterrey, Mexico, and a degree as a systems engineer from Universidad Autónoma de Colombia, Colombia. Like Castro, he found out about the joint degree option when he was about to start taking electives in his EVEMBA degree work. “I will graduate in the spring instead of the fall, which is not much of a delay. By handling my electives carefully, I will have the benefit of graduating with two degrees,” he said. Paredes found it easy to press on for the second degree. “Once you start studying, you are in the frame of mind to be a student and you have the focus to just continue on for a little longer,” he said. “I recommend completing the joint degree.” “Eight students, including Paredes, currently are taking advantage of these options and four more, including Castro, who have done so graduated this past summer,” said Ellie Browner, the Chapman School’s director of admissions. In addition to the MSF/IMBA and the MS-MIS/EVEMBA, students can pair the Master of Science in Finance with the Evening MBA (MSF/EVEMBA) or the Master of Science in Finance with the Executive MBA (MSF/EMBA). “The School also offers a joint MBA and Master of Arts in Latin American and Caribbean Studies (LAC/MBA), as well as an MBA and Juris Doctor (MBA/JD),” Browner said. For more information about graduate joint degree programs, contact the Chapman Graduate Admission and Student Services office.
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