Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
I would be happy to, Joan. Thank you. (Operator instructions) And your first question will come from the line of Amy Junker with Robert Baird. You may proceed.
Amy Junker – Robert W. Baird
Good afternoon. Hi, everyone.
Daniel Hamburger
Hi, Amy.
Amy Junker – Robert W. Baird
If I could just start, Rick, the margins came in better than I think, certainly than we’d expected, and you’d kind of guided that that would be down, and I just want to make sure I understand, was it an issue that you spent less or some of the spend that you had anticipated got pushed into maybe the second quarter or just because the enrolments have been so strong, you’ve seen better than expected leverage perhaps?
Rick Gunst
Well, I think when I – when we talked last conference call, I focused in on the operating expense increase. I don’t think I gave any specific guidance on margin. I said that it could be some slower growth in the first half of the year versus the back half of the year, but I think we did get a little bit more leverage given our top line growth and the operating expenses were about in the range we said, maybe a little bit less.
Amy Junker – Robert W. Baird
And just your thoughts now going forward in terms of second quarter I know seasonally that’s a higher quarter and now you are going to have your certification corp in there, any thoughts or any comments you’d be willing to make in terms of the SS&A spend in the second quarter?
Rick Gunst
Well, it’s harder to make comparisons on a run rate basis or even versus last year given the U.S. Ed piece. So I think the comments that I gave before still hold true where our run rate on operating expenses are still running well above prior year because we still have the overlap issues that we’ve been talking about with some of the investment spending we made in the back half of fiscal ’08 and some of the timing that was deferred from the first half to the second half last year, and so I think you will still see a sizable increase in SS&A expenses in the second quarter.
Amy Junker – Robert W. Baird
Great. Then last question then I’ll get back, I will let other people take a turn, but now that you’ve closed the U.S. Education Corp acquisition and congratulations on getting that done. You know, can you maybe just share with us what your expectations are for how much they are going to contribute in terms of revenue or margin, or what your growth expectations are so we can have some sense in terms of modeling going forward. We have the numbers on a June year-end basis, and I guess is the growth that you experienced in the fourth quarter kind of indicative of what you would expect for the remainder of the year?
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