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Perdoceo Education Corporation (PRDO)

Q2 2012 Earnings Call· Wed, Aug 1, 2012

$33.68

+2.48%

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Welcome to the Career Education Corporation’s Second Quarter 2012 Earnings Conference Call. My name is Christine and I will be your operator for today’s conference. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later we will conduct a question-and-answer session. Please note today’s conference is being recorded. I will now turn the call over to Mike Graham, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Sir, you may begin.

Mike Graham

Management

Thank you, Christine. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us on our second quarter 2012 earnings call. Also with me on the call this morning is Steve Lesnik, our President and Chief Executive Officer. Following the remarks made by Steve and I, the call will be opened for analysts and investor questions. This conference call is being webcast live within our Investor Relations section of our website at careered.com. A replay of this call will also be available on our site. If we don’t get to your question during the call, please call our Investor Relations department at 847-585-3899. As part of recently announced changes in leadership, John Springer, formerly Vice President of Strategy and Investor Relations has joined our Senior Leadership Team at AIU, American Intercontinental University. He serves as Vice President of Finance, Strategy, and University Operations for AIU reporting to the University President, Dr. George Miller. I’m pleased to announce that Matthew Tschanz, our Director of Corporate Finance has worked with John and I in Investor Relations over the past year will now partner directly with me in leading our IR efforts. Now, before I turn the call over to Steve, let me remind you that yesterday’s press release and remarks made today by Steve and I may include forward-looking statements as defined in Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act. These statements are based on information currently available to us and involve risks and uncertainties that could cause our actual results – our actual future results, performance, and business prospects and opportunities to differ materially from those expressed in or implied by these statements. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, those factors identified in our annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2011 and subsequent filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Except as expressly required by securities laws, we undertake no obligation to update those risk factors or to publicly announce the results of any of these forward-looking statements to reflect future events, developments or changed circumstances or for any other reason. With that now, now let me turn the call over to Steve.

Steve Lesnik

Management

Thanks, Mike. Good morning, everyone. Thank you very much for joining the discussion this morning of our second quarter year-to-date financial results. Last February, during our call with you, I said that 2012 would be a year of transition. I also suggested that it would be a year of results erosion. Both of those predictions have certainly turned out to be true. It’s a year of transition as we and others in the private sector education deal with public criticism, as well as regulatory initiatives aimed at limiting the sector’s growth in providing post-secondary education in America. Those and a number of other factors including the weak economy, uncertainty about employment, negative publicity regarding student loans, and in our case, some missteps last year have meant an erosion in student enrollment in our schools leading to declining revenues to extent greater than costs can be correspondingly controlled. I also said at that time the long range prospects for our universities and career schools were strong, as we had and continue to have, an array of advantages from technology to academics that benefits our students and enables them to realize aspirations and improve their lives. I remain optimistic about the long-term. Why? It’s simple. Our nation needs more people with post-secondary education. As the former chairman of one of the nation’s largest publicly education agencies overseeing all the colleges and universities here in Illinois, I know our public institutions across the nation are terribly starved for funding and will remain that way for the foreseeable future. I also believe these institutions consume more public funds than their private sector counterparts do. So the private sector must be part of the solution to produce better educated, more career ready citizens. Now, let me tell you what we are doing currently at Career…

Mike Graham

Management

Thanks, Steve, let me just begin by sharing with you some details of the financial performance for the quarter. During the quarter, we generated $369 million of revenue which is a decrease of 24% versus the second quarter of 2011. The operating loss was $108 million for the quarter. The second quarter results as we outlined in yesterday’s press release and in the form 10-Q filed with the SEC include non-cash goodwill and impairment charges of $85.6 million. The $85.6 million has three elements, $83.4 million of goodwill impairment, $41.9 million on Health, $41.5 million on Art & Design; $1.2 million of other asset impairment, $1.1 million in Health and $100,000 in AIU, and $1 million of trade name impairment for Health Education. To arrive at a more comparable basis versus last year, please remember that the operating income for the second quarter of 2011 included a non-cash charge of $2.7 million for goodwill and other intangible asset impairment. If you exclude the impact of these charges, the operating loss for the second quarter of 2012 was $23 million. All the comments on the remainder of the call will be on this non-GAAP basis, which excludes the charges I just discussed in both these years. As Steve discussed in his remarks, 2012 will be a year of transition, and we’re taking the steps necessary to reposition the company for the future. Simplification and consolidation are an important part of the strategy. Consistent with this approach for the company, during the quarter, our operational teams made the decision to teach-out three of our Health campuses, SBI Landover, Maryland, SBC Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and SBC Collinsville, Illinois. Further, a similar decision to no longer enroll new students was made by the AIU team for its South Florida campus in Westin, Florida. These decisions,…

Operator

Operator

Thank you. We will now begin the question-and-answer session. (Operator Instructions) The first question comes from the Jeff Silber from BMO Markets. Please go ahead. Jeff Silber – BMO Markets: Thank you so much. I know you’re not giving any specific guidance, but I wanted to look a little bit more longer term, specifically focused on the Health Education, Culinary Arts, and Art & Design segments, what kind of revenue levels on an annual basis do you think you need before those segments become profitable again?

Mike Graham

Management

Again, Jeff, this is Mike, I can’t give you guidance, you can – you have to do the models, as Steve said, looking closely at how to take out metrically driven costs which we’ve done throughout the year, looking at the fixed cost levels and looking for Dan Hurdle, as he joins the organization to streamline the three organizations. As you know, as we go into 2013, the level of Harrington student population leaving this year will dictate a good deal of the first half of next year. That will give you some idea about how to model next year’s out, but a longer-term basis, it’s not our goal to become profitable in these organizations, it’s our goal to become profitable and meet different cost of capital, investor returns, well above just becoming profitable. Jeff Silber – BMO Markets: Okay. Let me ask the question in another way then, from an incremental basis every time you lose a student, what’s the impact on the bottom line roughly in terms of incremental operating margins?

Mike Graham

Management

Again it’s hard to tell because of the step function of the class sizes, but traditionally some of the flow through, when you look at the models has been around 50% to 60% on less students. Jeff Silber – BMO Markets: Okay. And that hasn’t changed dramatically based on some of the changes you’ve made?

Mike Graham

Management

Hard to tell because the changes have been taking place and the changes are so numerous across the institution as we talked about last quarter, especially in Health, the visibility right now is very, very difficult, the moving parts and a lot of the teach-outs, all the additional investments in career services, the different models on 90/10, the pre-enrollment testing, you can imagine as we talked about last quarter with the different steps – different steps, the 19 step plan Jason Friesen put in place. It is very difficult to model each of the impacts but we know they are all in the right place in terms of student-first and they’re in the best interests of the company long term. Jeff Silber – BMO Markets: All right. I understand. Just a quick numbers question, what are you budgeting for capital spending for the remainder of the year?

Mike Graham

Management

Traditionally it would run around 3% of revenues. So I don’t think the level would change dramatically from this quarter’s $8 million level so probably – hard to say on a revenue basis because revenue is changing but let’s say $8 million to $10 million a quarter going forward. Jeff Silber – BMO Markets: Okay. Great. I’ll jump back in the queue. Thanks so much.

Mike Graham

Management

Thanks, Jeff.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from Sara Gubins from Bank of America. Please go ahead. Sara Gubins – Bank of America: Thank you, good morning. Given that you’re not looking to consolidate the OPIDs, how should we think about where you’ll fall out on 90/10 and also your 10-Q mentioned that some schools might delay some federal financial aid until early 2013 to meet 90/10. I’m just wondering if that’s something that’s done as a standard.

Steve Lesnik

Management

This is Steve. Thank you for the question. I’ll answer it in two parts. One as I said in my prepared remarks, we remain optimistic that the OPIDs that failed in the past will pass in 2012 based upon all of the steps that we have taken throughout the year in order to address 90/10 requirements. That’s the first part of your question. The second part of your question with respect to withholding funds, yes that is something that is commonly done in the industry has been done by a number of companies. In our particular case, we have also done it occasionally in the past but we have a system for doing it whereby the stipend – the living stipend that the student receives is not affected in any way. So, I know that has recently been pointed out that withholding funds would in some cases affect student living expenses or stipends and that is not the case with Career Ed. Sara Gubins – Bank of America: Okay. And then, could you give us updated thoughts on share repurchase. Are you holding off on this point given the fundamentals or for any regulatory reasons?

Mike Graham

Management

I think you can see in the quarter with the operating loss we’re experiencing and the decrease in operating cash flow, we still have authorization available. We obviously look to the Department of Ed financial responsibility ratio at the end of the year. Historically, we’ve bought back shares right around the level of net earnings because of the way the calculation works and with an operating loss to be experienced this year share repurchases would become difficult under the calculation. Sara Gubins – Bank of America: Okay. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from Gary Bisbee from Barclays. Please go ahead.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Hi, it’s (inaudible) for Gary. Can you give us some color around how to think about new enrollment trends at AIU and CTU next quarter after you’ve lapped the SOAR impact?

Mike Graham

Management

Sure. I think the SOAR lapses in the quarter so we should look to the level that I quoted in my prepared remarks of the 15% to 19% decline after the adjustment for SOAR so we’ll anniversary out – call it roughly 500 to 1,000 basis point adjustment. Our trend right now as I stated doesn’t show a material change in our trajectories as we go into third quarter starts. So the modeling would be consistent with the adjusted basis after SOAR in the second quarter.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Okay. And just on your teach-outs, what incremental cost do you see going forward as a result of those and when further down the line, do you see those costs starting to come out?

Mike Graham

Management

From the teach-out model and because of the way we have done teach-outs before in our discontinued operations, if you look to the past year, as you can see the trend of cost early on in the teach-out, there is a slight increase in the profitability of the school because you no longer have admissions or marketing efforts around the school. Then over time as the class sizes decline, but we keep career services people, we keep academic people, everyone else on the campus to serve the student till the last student graduates, we tend to run into operating losses. For the most part the only obligation after the closure of the teach-out is any lease obligation and for three of the four teach-outs that we spoke of, the teach-out is commensurate with the end of the lease. Only one of the leases will continue on in discontinued operations after the close of the teach-out in August of 2015.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Okay, and just a last question on your calendar shift. You mentioned, I think you’ve got another calendar shift next quarter in Culinary. So the start period will be in October and what about for any other segments, is that the only calendar shift for next quarter?

Mike Graham

Management

That’s the only calendar shift, obviously Health, because we had a calendar shift in the second quarter, that starts now in the third quarter which I spoke to in the remarks, and Culinary’s just missing one start, which just trickles over from September to October; those are the only non-comparables.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Got it, thanks a lot.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from Jerry Herman from Stifel Nicolaus. Please go ahead. Jerry Herman – Stifel Nicolaus: Thanks, good morning, everybody. Guys given your commentary about simplification and consolidation in light of the deteriorating situation, would you suspect the need for a more radical action plan, i.e., cost reduction or other in some way with again particular focus on the Career Schools.

Steve Lesnik

Management

Well, I would say what we said in the past about reducing the number of institutions and brands we have from what is now the high-teens to the mid-to-low single-digits. If we can do that, we would consider that a reasonably radical transformation plan. The question is how fast we can achieve it. So, we do think that that’s a rather aggressive plan for changing the way we conduct business. And as I said in my prepared remarks, we fully expect that it will have the impact financially of reducing the cost of complexity and inefficiency that we now incur. Jerry Herman – Stifel Nicolaus: And, Steve, just a follow-up. Is there internally, an expedited effort to do so again in light of the deterioration?

Steve Lesnik

Management

We are not oblivious to the impact and implications of the numbers that we have experienced in the last two to five months. We are very, very much aware of the implication of those numbers and we recognize that the strategic plan while everybody recognizes that it’s a sound logical, reasonable. And as you put it radical plan that we have to accelerate the implementation of it as much as we can. Jerry Herman – Stifel Nicolaus: Thank you. And just question for Mike. I mean, obviously, we’re looking at your balance sheet and it certainly shows a healthy amount of cash. But I guess, if you could just add some additional color on some qualitative statements on what you deem to be the most significant, say calls on that cash, i.e., operating losses, lease obligations, the position of international cash and the like?

Mike Graham

Management

Sorry, Jerry, in terms of the cash requirements, if you look at the split, $370 million of cash, $250 million of which is domestic, $120 million of which is international. There are – as described in the 10-K, there is within the non-profit entities of international about $63 million of cash that’s based in those entities, so that’s the first call on cash. The second call on cash is obviously to make sure from a working capital standpoint, a balance sheet standpoint in funding operations in terms of having an operating loss that we’re there, and that we again meet everything, the requirements of the DOE, and we’re going to make sure that on a capital expenditure basis, as we go forward we continue to invest into the different facilities and campuses for the students. Obviously in terms of our operating cash flow and our balance sheet in terms of material acquisitions at this time or other things, we’re not putting that as a high priority. And as you know the business traditionally runs a negative working capital level, so as the business deleverages, some of that negative working capital spins back out. Jerry Herman – Stifel Nicolaus: Great. Thanks, guys. I’ll turn it over.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from Brandon Dobell from William Blair. Please go ahead. Brandon Dobell – William Blair: Thanks. Guys, what kind of timeframe should we expect to hear back from you on some of these major or larger initiatives like the Price Waterhouse and kind of look at the business, sort of the processes, some of the decisions around the brand consolidation or maybe a little more visibility on 90/10, are those a Q3 call kind of prospect or are we talking the fourth quarter call in early 2013?

Steve Lesnik

Management

This is Steve, thanks for the question. Brandon Dobell – William Blair: Hi, Steve.

Steve Lesnik

Management

Obviously as I said, we’re going to do on as much of an accelerated basis as we possibly can. I mean the only way I can really prospectively answer that question, however, is to say that as material things occur, we will release them publically in a filing and that as we have quarterly calls to the thing – to the extent that things have taken place in the quarter, we’re happy to talk to you about them as fully as we can. But, we’re not going to be predictive in what we say. Brandon Dobell – William Blair: All right, fair enough. And then maybe remind us of what the process is with the schools that are on show cause with ACCSC, is there like there was with ACICS a particular time around the meeting of their board that we should use as kind of, I guess a milepost for when there should be some more information about those schools.

Steve Lesnik

Management

I believe that they are planning to meet. They don’t meet every month, but my understanding is that, there is a meeting in both September and October. The key date is that we are required to get our formal response to ACCSC by September 7. Obviously, they need it in time for their reviewers and those that’ll be making, adjudicating and judging the material, time to think about it and look at it. So, I don’t know whether they will get to it in their September meeting or their October meeting, but we hope that they would look at it rather sooner rather than later. As I said in my prepared remarks, I do expect that they’re going to be as thoughtful and careful in their examination as ACICS was, as you know there’s a lot of interest in how the accreditors do these sorts of things. I can only tell you that we have sent much of the same material that we sent to ACICS, it’s voluminous, it’s transparent and I would hopeful – I would hope that eventually we would get the same outcome. Brandon Dobell – William Blair: Okay. And final one from me, you mentioned being kind of held back on new programs given the application process for the OPID consolidation. Where should we expect or where are you guys planning on rolling out new programs and is there – are we talking a backlog of a handful of programs or is it a much bigger kind of pool of new opportunities for you guys to roll out.

Steve Lesnik

Management

While we’ve been in the penalty box now for some time on these things... Brandon Dobell – William Blair: Yeah.

Steve Lesnik

Management

Due to the fact that we’ve had the consolidation application pending. So, there has been – there is a backlog, and it is very important that we get programs that today enable us to place our students reliably. So, we are dealing with that backlog now. Obviously, we have to go through all of our accreditation processes and we’re trying to do that in a way that we can apply for new programs on an orderly basis and we’re prioritizing the ones that we think ought to go first and we’re sort of queuing them up in that way with the strongest criteria being needs of employers and employment needs in the marketplace.

Mike Graham

Management

And then Brandon, just to be clear, because of the consolidation was the national schools, ground schools only. Brandon Dobell – William Blair: Right.

Mike Graham

Management

There were not constraints on AIU, CTU International, so new program launches continue in those schools which are over half the company? Brandon Dobell – William Blair: Yes, okay. Thanks, guys.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from Suzie Stein from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead. Thomas Allen – Morgan Stanley: Hi, guys. It’s Thomas Allen filling in for Suzie. Now that gainful employment appears to be off the table at least for the time being, are you operating and planning as if the rule comes back or not? Thank you.

Steve Lesnik

Management

That’s a very interesting question that is being asked repeatedly. I don’t think that we can predict with certainty whether or not it will come back. I don’t think anybody can. It will depend upon a great many factors including political factors. What we are doing is assuming that we should look at what we think is in the best interest of our students, it gives us the opportunity to place them, to place them in a way that they are able to repay their loans whether gainful employment exists or doesn’t exist. That’s the guiding principle that we’ve adopted at the school, at our institutions. Can a student complete, can we place the student and can we place the student in a way that they can repay the loans that they incur? And that’s the policy we will use whether the Department Of Education does or doesn’t look to reinstitute gainful employment. And as everybody knows, if the Department Of Education does seek to do that, it’s likely not to happen between – before 2014 or 2015 because of the processes that need to be gone through. Thomas Allen – Morgan Stanley: Okay. Thank you. And then other schools that have similar orientation programs have discussed modifying them, so that because their programs were turning away some prepared potential students. You said that 4,700 potential starts have turned away year-to-date. Any thoughts on modifying SOAR and the other programs to get some of these students? Thanks.

Steve Lesnik

Management

Yes. As I mentioned in our last call, and I think Mike talked about it as well. We are looking at our SOAR program and alternatives to the SOAR program to make sure that on the one hand, we are putting our students through the right paces to give them the highest probability of persisting and completing the courses, and at the same time, not leaving on the editing room floor so to be speak, students who do – may not test well or may not seem at first blush to be able to do it, but would have a chance to persist and complete. So we’re trying to address both parts of the equation. There is no question that some qualified students not only at Career Ed, but at other schools have been denied admission, despite the fact that they could possibly make it, but not probably make it. Thomas Allen – Morgan Stanley: And quickly just the sizing or the timeframe of those changes, the size of potential students.

Steve Lesnik

Management

Mike, could speak to the numbers, but in terms of making changes, we are looking at SOAR program and if we do make changes in the SOAR program, modifications or changes, it will probably come before the end of the year with the impact primarily falling in 2013.

Mike Graham

Management

I think from a sizing standpoint if you look at the 4,700 starts, I spoke of, about half of those are in university, half of those are in ground. It’s too early to tell, I think as Steve said there’s various methods to allow a student access to the school and to assess a student over a broader period of time than just a test, whether they have the propensity to persist and graduate and we continue to look at that. And so, it’s too early to give you numbers on what any adjustments may be, but that will give you an idea about the current split. Thomas Allen – Morgan Stanley: Okay. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from Jeff Meuler from Baird & Company. Please go ahead. Jeff Meuler – Baird & Company: Thank you. Just wanted to ask about AIU and CTU inquiries, I caught the data point that the internal generated leads at CTU are up, but are total leads at those institutions still declining and if so, I understand it’s a tough market, but what would you attribute the continued declines to? Just the timing of when you kind of rolled out the CTU branding campaign or are there other factors that I guess would potentially concern you about their competitive position or what – I guess turned – what gives you confidence that they remained in a good competitive position?

Steve Lesnik

Management

Well, we believe that the University side our business, looked at together remains a strong franchise, so let me say that first. Secondly, I think we and everybody has reported some resistance recently in getting applications, leads, inquiries, whatever term you want to use. And I think I discussed in my prepared remarks what we perceive to be some of the reasons that queries of the company and leads through any channel are reduced, it is the negative publicity – it’s all things that I mentioned. Also, students are being more cautious and therefore, it’s taking more time for them to make a decision and we’re hearing more and more deferrals from people who seem to be deciding, I’m going to put this off for awhile and because of that, because of the falling interest, you’re finding the environment to be far more competitive than it has been in the past for qualified students. Don’t forget also it’s a smaller pool of candidates when you’re focusing more on those that can persist and complete, which is, of course, what we’re doing and I suspect others are doing as well. So, the franchises themselves remain very strong and are improving their ability to both reach out to and be receptive to new student applications, but the competition is fierce and the pool is shrinking somewhat; is that responsive? Jeff Meuler – Baird & Company: It is but, so I guess the question is, in your view are the declines either in starts or in inquires due to that environment or in this more competitive environment, is it your view that you may also be losing share or I guess if you think it’s just the environment, the question is, I’m just trying to figure out the competitive positioning versus the environment and how much of it is a tough environment versus potential share loss, if you can say anything to that.

Steve Lesnik

Management

Yeah. Well, I can understand... I think we’d all like to be able to quantify if we could how much is due to the shrinking pool so to speak for the various reasons that I’ve mentioned and how much is due to the more intense competition. I don’t think I can quantify which of those is the greater factor or which among those is the greatest factor. What I have said is that we recognize, we think, what is going on out there in the marketplace, we’re sensitive to the changes that are taking place in the marketplace. And, we have internally and with the help of a new external consultant are beginning to re-examine everything we do to make sure that we can be as competitive as anybody and maintain or expand our market share in the new environment. Jeff Meuler – Baird & Company: Okay. And then just a follow-up on the balance sheet, any update on the credit facility, Mike?

Mike Graham

Management

The credit facility matures on the October 31 in the fourth quarter. We’re in negotiations with our banks. We’ve great bank partners that have helped us all along. They have expressed a willingness to discuss a facility. Obviously the facility we have, which was entered in 2010 in a much different business environment and a much different credit environment, and it will be nowhere near the favorable terms we have there. There is no assurance we’ll have a facility given the operating losses we’re working hard with the banks. Too early to give you more details but in the next quarter call we’ll be able to share more. Jeff Meuler – Baird & Company: Thanks, Mike.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from Corey Greendale from First Analysis. Please go ahead. Corey Greendale – First Analysis: Hi, good morning. Just following up on the question about the competitive and the economic environment, given your responses, Steve, how are you thinking about tuition pricing and I know you are potentially raising price some places because of 90/10, but are you considering either discounting tuition, giving more scholarships to help yourselves competitively?

Steve Lesnik

Management

Well, look, pricing has to be the part of the equation I think we all know that. And you’re correct in that for 90/10 purposes, pricing has to move in a particular direction. But, the most compelling criteria is whether the prospective students, whether the consumers will pay the price for the service that you’re offering, and also whether they will be able to repay any indebtedness they incur in wherever they are placed subsequent to the education. We are looking at trying to adjust our pricing for the programs that we have in place, to be both competitive and to enable the student to repay, and at the same time, be responsive to the 90/10 imperatives. It’s sort of a simultaneous equation that we are dealing with. Corey Greendale – First Analysis: Okay, and then I had a couple of regulatory questions. There was I think some new language in the Q about the Department of Education doing an inquiry about potential violations or misrepresentation. I know they’ve requested information before. Can you just clarify is there something new or different in their communication to you about what they’re doing?

Mike Graham

Management

Corey, that’s just a continuing disclosure. There is no news to report on that. The Department of Ed, as part of the consolidation process, as part of other things that are going on in the company has asked over time for various parts of information and we participate very frequently and fully with them and give them anything they ask for and any dialogues we have are continuing and open. Corey Greendale – First Analysis: Okay, and then there is also some language in the Q about some ongoing information requests from HLC in connection with the CTU reaccreditation, can you just put that in context, how common is it to have continuing information requests after a focus visit and some sense of what they might be looking for?

Steve Lesnik

Management

It is not, I don’t know whether it’s common, but it is not uncommon to have what are called subsequent visits and it often happens. And so I would say it’s somewhere between not uncommon and routine. It is not anything that is that out of the ordinary in our judgment and we believe that the revisits by the peer review team are going to be handled over the coming period with some facility. Corey Greendale – First Analysis: Okay. And just one last one, the one piece of good news, it sounds like is you’re making some progress on the placement front. Can you give just comment on the kinds of feedback you’re getting from employers and what I’m curious about is, whether there’s any impact of the negative publicity on employers’ willingness to hire graduates of your institutions?

Steve Lesnik

Management

I’m happy to answer to that question, the answer is no. There are – we are seeing on the intake side as I’ve said several times in the call already with the reluctance of students to make the decision to attend post-secondary education, which I consider to be very unfortunate for them because they’re going to need that education to get jobs in the long-term, but we’re not seeing any impact on the outgo side, that is on the outcome side with employers. I think that they are still doing what employers do, which is to evaluate the strength and qualifications of the individual candidates and they are still accepting our graduates both on the University side and the Career side. Our marked improvement in placements is a testimony to that. I think you know that we have redoubled our efforts to place our graduates and we’re having really good results. So I would say that is evidence, that we’re not seeing a resistance on the employer side. Corey Greendale – First Analysis: Great. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

There’s time for one final question. The final question comes from James Samford from Citigroup. Please go ahead. James Samford – Citigroup: Great, thank you. I just wanted to touch on the placement issue as well. It sounds like you’re still hiring more, where are you in terms of your staffing levels on your placement staff at this point?

Steve Lesnik

Management

Well, we have, as I said in my prepared remarks we’ve hired at least 75 new people this year, you do have normal attrition during the year, so we’re not 75 over where we are. But we watch very closely our ratio of placement advisors, guidance counselors to students and our ratios are greatly improved over the past.

Mike Graham

Management

James, we have about 14% more career service advisors right now than we had this time last year. James Samford – Citigroup: And I guess it sounds like a lot of the OPID consolidation efforts et cetera is really a function of trying to offer new programs. How do you feel the programs that you have today are potentially oversaturated in some of your markets given the macro factors that are taking place right now.

Steve Lesnik

Management

Yeah, I’m not sure that it’s so much that the programs are oversaturated, I think it’s the fact that we offer some programs, where there’s not great demand by employers right now. Employment needs do change from time-to-time and you have to stay alert to the changes. So what we’re more concerned about is particularly in our ground schools is the demand locally for jobs that’s changing. We have to be alert and stay up-to-date on that to make sure that what we’re offering is what the employers want in that general locality. James Samford – Citigroup: Any regional differences that you’ve seen that you can talk about on a local basis?

Steve Lesnik

Management

Well, again, if we had some of local people in here, they could probably answer the question better than I. But, what we do here at our level is that on a regional basis there are different employment needs and we know that as we study MSIs that in some MSIs there is a demand for X and in another MSI there is a demand for Y but not X. For example, we’re in Sioux Falls, South Dakota – Sioux Falls, South Dakota is both a regional medical center and it’s also a credit card services processing center. So they have certain kinds of needs there. And in another location in Pittsburgh, the needs are entirely different. And we have to be sensitive to that and we are working very hard to make sure that we adapt as quickly as possible to the needs of the MSIs in which our schools are located. James Samford – Citigroup: Okay. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Gentlemen that was the last question for today. Please go ahead with any final remarks.

Steve Lesnik

Management

Thank you everybody for being on for various parts of – I know you’re in various parts of the country. We appreciate your continued interest in our company and we will see you all down the line, and if there’s anything that we didn’t answer completely today, I know that Mike is always at your disposal and Matt will be, too. Thanks again.

Operator

Operator

Thank you for participating in the Career Education Corporation’s Second Quarter 2012 Earnings Conference Call. This concludes the conference for today. You may all disconnect at this time.