By Jong Eun Jung
Bella La Rosa
Although Bella La Rosa (MSF’20) did major in Finance in undergrad at Mississippi College, she wanted to go further and get a graduate degree in finance. “The undergrad finance major skims the surface (of finance). So I wanted to get a deeper understanding of finance and really hone my skills,” La Rosa explained. She chose the MSF Program at Vanderbilt Business because it was one of the few schools in the U.S. with a one-year graduate program.
La Rosa knew she wanted to recruit for investment banking right away thanks to a summer internship experience she had during college at Sempra Energy, where she was given a lot of responsibilities, including mutual funds research. Before the MSF program, she completed the Pre-3 online program, where her career mentor connected her with a Vanderbilt Business alum who worked in investment management at Cambridge Associates.
“(My mentor said that) this company basically consults different pension foundations and finds them different places where they can invest their money. I (thought), ‘that sounds like my dream job,’” La Rosa said. “And so he put me in contact with her, and the way she described (her job), I was like, ‘this is exactly what I want to do.’”
She had a couple of networking calls with the alum and ended up applying and interviewing for an investment analyst position at Cambridge Associates. La Rosa soon received and accepted a full-time offer. “I’m excited to be part of a team environment that fosters growth, excellence, and participation,” she said.
Click through La Rosa’s timeline below to find out how she landed the offer.
