Program Director

Hossein Kazemi, Ph.D., CFA

Dr. Hossein Kazemi, Ph.D., CFA, is the Program Director for the CAIA Association. He oversees the development, execution, and analysis of the CAIA program's curriculum and examinations. Dr. Kazemi has been involved in the CAIA Association since inception as a senior advisor and board member. In addition, he has worked with universities and industry organizations to introduce them to the CAIA program. Dr. Kazemi is on sabbatical leave as a Professor of Finance from the Isenberg School of Management at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. Dr. Kazemi is currently an Associate Director of the Center for International Securities & Derivatives Markets, a nonprofit organization devoted to research in the area of alternative investments, a co-founder of the CAIA Association, and home to CISDM Hedge Fund/CTA Database. He was involved in the development of first investible hedge fund indices as well. He is an Associate Editor of The Journal of Alternative Investments and The Financial Review. His research has been in the areas of valuations of equity and fixed income securities, asset allocation for traditional and alternative asset classes, and evaluation and replication of active management investment products. He has a Ph.D. in finance from the University of Michigan. Dr. Kazemi lives in Northampton, MA, with his wife and son.

Director of Exams

Nelson Lacey, Ph.D., CFA

Nelson J. Lacey is an associate professor of finance at the Isenberg School of Management at the University of Massachusetts. He came to Amherst in 1985 after having earned his Ph.D. in finance from the Pennsylvania State University. At Penn State he studied corporate finance and fixed income markets, topics that would guide his research over the next twenty or so years. He also worked in modeling the state economy, and designed a set of leading indicators for Pennsylvania. He earned an MBA from the Arizona State University in 1980, and became a CFA charterholder in 1999.

Professor Lacey joined CAIA at its inception. He has been active in working on the program's curriculum and examinations since 2003, and became Director of Examinations in 2004. With the help of the CAIA Advisory Board and Curriculum and Examination Committee, he has been instrumental in designing the current CAIA exam format.

Full biography...

Senior Advisor – Examinations

Don Chambers, Ph.D., CAIA

Dr. Chambers assists the Director of Examinations in all areas of the examination process, including but not limited to item development, exam development, and item analysis. He also assists in the delivery of CAIA Level I and Level II examinations.

Dr. Chambers is the Walter E. Hanson KPMG Professor of Finance at Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania. He has published forty articles and several books in investments, corporate finance and risk management. He received a Ph.D. in Finance from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a B.S. in Accounting from SUNY-Binghamton.

Dr. Chambers began at Lafayette College after serving at the University of Baltimore as the Frank Baker Research Chair in Finance. His prior academic positions were at Rochester Institute of Technology, Penn State University, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Dr. Chambers served at The Bank of New York on a consulting basis in risk management regarding the bank's many diverse operations involving credit risk, event risk, capital cost allocation, operational risk and liquidity risk. He also served at Karpus Investment Management of Pittsford, NY.

Dr. Chambers earned the CAIA charter in September 2003 as a member of the first group of candidates to complete the requirements.

In his spare time, Dr. Chambers enjoys jogging, reading, and exercising his dog, a boxer named Tiger Lilly.

Senior Associate Director of Exams

Kristaps Licis

Kristaps works in all phases of the examination process including item development and analysis and exam design and delivery. He has been a consultant on the exam development team since the CAIA Association's inception, joining full-time in December 2008. He worked for a trend-following Commodity Trading Advisor (CTA) fund for a number of years, developing trading and reporting systems. As a Research Associate for the Center for International Derivatives and Securities Markets (CISDM), Kristaps developed and managed a risk management platform for a large portfolio of CTAs. He has a number of publications with the Journal of Alternative Investments. Kristaps has a BA in Economics from Riga Technical University in Latvia and an MBA from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.

Kristaps enjoys travel and photography. He lives in Amherst with his son.

Associate Director of Exam Administration

Kathy Champagne

As the Associate Director of Exam Administration, Kathy assists the Director of Exams in managing the development, construction, grading, and analysis of the CAIA examinations. She brings twenty years of experience in the assessment industry to her work at CAIA.

In her free time, Kathy enjoys yoga, dancing, walking, gardening, knitting, cooking, and photography.

Associate Director, Curriculum Project Manager

Jeanne Miller

Jeanne works with the Program Director and acts as a liaison between the Director and various committees, CAIA members, exam item developers, practitioners, academic experts and publishers, ensuring receipt of deliverables. She is also manages the process for reviewing and publishing curriculum materials.

Jeanne received a B.A. in Management from Western Michigan University. Jeanne enjoys all of the great New England nature - including the hiking, kayaking and skiing and all of the bears and spends whatever free time exploring New England.

Program Assistant

Andrew Tetreault

As Program Assistant, Andrew supports the strategic objective of managing the day-to-day developmental and administrative operations of the Curriculum processes. He works closely with members of the curriculum department to complete all projects and strives to maintain a wealth of knowledge and current readings for the curriculum library.

Andrew is a graduate of UMass-Amherst, where he received a bachelor’s degree in Applied Mathematics and Economics. He is also an eagle scout from the Boy Scouts of America. In his free time Andrew enjoys being outdoors, cooking, sports, and summer concerts.