Two years at Haas gave Santiago Campero just what he was looking for: "a top-notch education that prepared me to make good business decisions."

Before coming to Haas, Campero could follow discussions of management issues; now he can lead them. "There is more depth to my reasoning. I don't have to rely on intuition. Instead, I have knowledge," he says.

Two classes stand out for Campero. Deals, taught by Professor Rui de Figueiredo, looked at ways to structure transactions to meet business objectives. "This course provided an insightful perspective into the economic forces at play in many business transactions," Campero says. Behavioral Finance with Professor Terrance Odean, he says, "complemented the 'rational actor' perspective taught in other economics classes. We studied how people's behavior routinely deviates from rationality and how behavioral biases influence financial markets."

"My professors were very good at making me question conventional wisdom and the implicit assumptions you encounter every day in the business world."