67 WALL STREET, New York - August 29, 2012 - The Wall Street Transcript has just published its Education Report offering a timely review of the sector to serious investors and industry executives. This special feature contains expert industry commentary through in-depth interviews with public company CEOs, Equity Analysts and Money Managers. The full issue is available by calling (212) 952-7433 or via The Wall Street Transcript Online.

Topics covered: Enrollment and Retention Trends - Regulatory Risks - Chinese Education Growth Catalysts - For-Profit Institutions - Online Content Distribution

Companies include: Grand Canyon Education, Inc. (LOPE) and many others.

In the following excerpt from the Education Report, the CEO of Grand Canyon Education discusses the outlook for his company for investors.

TWST: If you would, please start by introducing our readers to Grand Canyon with a brief history and an overview of the company today.

Mr. Mueller: Grand Canyon University started in Prescott, Ariz., in 1949, stayed there for two years before moving to Phoenix in 1951. We're still on the property that was purchased in 1951 to build the university. It was started by a group of Southern Baptists who wanted to create a private, Christian, nondenominational university in Phoenix. There was a close connection with the Baptist Church for many years, although there were Christians of all denominations that attended Grand Canyon through the years, and it was known as a very strong, private, traditional, Christian liberal arts university. About 1,500 students were on campus typically.

They had really strong programs in teacher education and health care, particularly in nursing. The university eventually developed a business program, a full array of liberal arts programs, majors in sociology and psychology and history, and a fine arts department with a focus on theater and musical performance. GCU also had a pretty strong athletic program that competed at the NAIA level. About 10 years ago, Grand Canyon fell into very serious financial difficulties. In fact, we were $20 million in the red at the end of 2003 and were ready to close the university. Brothers Brent and Chris Richardson stepped in and were willing to take control of the university and also assume that $20 million in debt.

That transaction took place, and they assumed control of the university, but didn't have the total $20 million. Their first choice was to stay as a not-for-profit university and go out and raise the money in terms of donations. But unfortunately Grand Canyon's graduates were teachers and nurses, and - God bless them, they provide great service to society, but - there weren't millions of dollars to get the university out of its financial trouble. So they decided to change the university's status to a for-profit status and to build a business plan that invites investment. The business plan was to mimic the University of Phoenix's online program. They hoped it would extend GCU's mission by offering programs delivered online to working adult students and perhaps make the university profitable. The Richardson brothers developed that online program from 2004 to 2008. They had about 15,000 online students. Most of those students were 32 to 34 years old. That did help the university become profitable and got rid of the debt.

At that point, the decision was made to get another infusion of funds by going public. I was at University of Phoenix at that point as President of Apollo Group, and they asked if I was interested in coming over to GCU. When I looked at this opportunity, I was very interested because there's really no other private, traditional, Christian university in Arizona, which is very unusual. There are 70 such universities in California, and other states like Michigan and Indiana and Ohio have 20 or more. Arizona was really an anomaly in that sense, and I saw a chance to create something very unique here.

So I came over in 2008, and we took the company public in November 2008. We received an infusion of $250 million of funds and started to build out the university.

Read more from the original source:
Fast Growth Education Company Lowers University Tuitions with No State Tax Subsidies: Business Model Combines Online ...