Thank you for standing by. My name is Kathleen, I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Perdoceo Education Corporation Second Quarter 2024 Earnings Conference Call. All lines have been placed on mute all throughout the presentation to prevent any background noise. Thank you. I would like to turn the call over to Mr. Sam Gibbons, Investor Relations. Please go ahead sir.

Thank you, operator. Good afternoon, everyone and thank you for joining us for our second quarter 2024 earnings call. With me on the call today is, Todd Nelson, President and Chief Executive Officer, and Ashish Ghia, Chief Financial Officer. This conference call is being webcast live within the Investor Relations section at Perdoceoed.com. A webcast replay will also be available on our site, and you can always contact the Alpha IR Group for Investor Relations support. Let me remind you that this afternoon’s earnings release and remarks made today include forward-looking statements as defined in Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. These statements are based on assumptions made by and information currently available to Perdoceo Education and involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual future results, performance, 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 Perdoceo’s most recent annual report on Form 10-K and subsequent filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Except as expressly required by the Securities laws, the company undertakes no obligation to update those factors or any forward-looking statements to reflect future events, developments or change circumstances or for any other reason. In addition, today’s remarks refer to non-GAAP financial measures, which are intended to supplement, but not substitute for the most directly comparable GAAP measures. The earnings release that accompanies today’s call contains financial and other quantitative information to be discussed today, as well as the reconciliation of the GAAP to non-GAAP measures, and is available within the Investor Relations page of the company’s website. With that, I’d like to turn the call over to Todd Nelson. Todd?

Thank you, Sam. Good afternoon, everyone and thank you for joining us for our second quarter 2024 earnings call. I’ll discuss some of the key business highlights through the second quarter, and then Ashish will review our operating and financial performance in more detail and discuss our outlook for the year. However, before we begin, I’d like to thank our faculty, student support staff and all other employees for their ongoing commitment and hard work and serving and educating our students. We ended the first half of 2024 on a strong note as it relates to student retention and engagement. As a result, second quarter operating results came in ahead of our expectations discussed on the last earnings call, partially due to better than expected revenue results. Let me now review some of the key observations and general business highlights. We continue to experience high levels of student retention and engagement at both CTU and AIUS with student retention at multi-year highs. Our faculty and student support teams remain dedicated to educating and serving our students, and we anticipate that retention should continue to trend at these levels through the remainder of 2024. Quarter and year-to-date marketing and admission spends and commensurately prospective student inquiry generation was lower during the second quarter as compared to 2023. Aided by data analytics, we continue to adjust marketing strategies to further improve our focus on identifying prospective students who are more likely to succeed at one of our universities, as well as comply and adapt with updated expectations from various federal agencies around prospective student outreach. We are also focused on enhancing the processes that support our corporate engagement programs. These programs are a key priority for our academic institutions, and we'll continue to invest in staff and technology to grow them efficiently…

Thank you, Todd. I will review the second quarter results and then discuss our balance sheet and 2024 outlook before handing the call back to Todd for his closing remarks. Please note, all comparisons I discussed are versus the comparative prior year period, unless otherwise stated. Please also note that the total student enrollment numbers that I discussed or any enrollment trends that I refer to exclude learners pursuing non-degree seeking professional development programs and degree seeking non-title for self-paced programs at our universities. Let us begin with an overview of our operating results. Net income for the second quarter was $38.4 million or $0.57 per diluted share compared to $54.7 million or $0.80 per diluted share. Adjusted earnings per diluted share, which we believe is more indicative of the underlying operating performance, was $0.60 as compared to $0.61. Second quarter operating income of $46 million was $2.1 million lower as compared to the prior year quarter. Adjusted operating income, which we believe is more indicative of the underlying operating performance and excludes certain significant and non-cash items was $50.9 million for the second quarter as compared to $55.2 million. As expected, revenue for the quarter was lowered by $19.8 million, which was mostly offset with $17.7 million of lower expenses. This expected decrease in revenue was primarily due to the prior year operational changes at AIU System as well as changes being made within our professional development offerings at CTU. Operating expenses during the second quarter were lower within marketing, admissions, and bad debt as well as lower legal expenses related to the borrower defense to repayment applications. Additionally, we also realized cost savings from right-sizing processes and operations that support our professional development offerings at CTU as we focus on delivering academic programs more effectively and efficiently and…

Thank you, Ashish. In closing, I'm proud of the way our company executed through the second quarter of 2024, and I'm pleased with the progress we are continuing to expect into the second half of the year. Our academic institutions remain focused on serving and educating our students, and our investments will continue to prioritize student experiences and academic outcomes. Upon completion, the acquisition of St. Augustine will further enhance Perdoceo's overall value proposition with three separate quality academic institutions providing a broad spectrum of post-secondary educational offerings. I'd like to thank all of our students and staff once again for their ongoing hard work and dedication. Thank you for joining us.

Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes today's call. Thank you all for joining. You may now disconnect.