Lara Kattan

Lara Kattan serves as a Clinical Assistant Professor in the Operations Management department at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, teaching data science courses including:

• Data Analysis with Python and SQL (Winter/Spring 2025; Autumn/Winter/Spring 2026)
• Data Analysis with R and Python (Autumn 2024)
• Data Visualization for Decision-Making (Spring 2025/Spring 2026)

She holds an MPP in public policy with an econometrics concentration from the University of Chicago and a BA in economics and political science from Northwestern University. Prior to academia, she specialized in machine learning for finance as a consultant at McKinsey & Company and Ernst & Young.

Her research integrates Bayesian statistical methods with financial modeling, focusing on machine learning applications for quantitative finance and data-driven decision systems. This expertise directly informs her teaching of programming languages and analytical tools for business contexts, bridging operations management theory with practical financial analytics.