You are given a text that consists of multiple sentences. Your task is to perform abstractive summarization on this text. Use your understanding of the content to express the main ideas and crucial details in a shorter, coherent, and natural sounding text. 
Text: Total revenue was approximately $1.5 billion, representing a 7.5% decline versus last year, which exceeded our expectation and reflects continued sequential improvement.
As anticipated, our Aviation segment remains the primary driver behind the revenue decrease.
On both the GAAP and an adjusted basis, earnings grew by a 160% or more year-over-year.
GAAP continuing earnings per share grew to a $1.10 per share or $1.01 per share on an adjusted basis.
Adjusted EBITDA margins expanded more than 400 basis points to 8.3% compared to last year.
Anchoring these results was elevated demand for higher margin Work Orders for virus protection as well as our EnhancedClean services which are longer term in nature.
Effective labor management continued to be a lever for profitability.
As you may remember, the majority of our contracts are performance based, so any efficiencies we find in staffing as occupancy drops or schools are in a hybrid situation [Phonetic] in order to our benefit.
This is the advantage of having a flexible labor model.
Earl, will discuss our segments in more detail, but overall, our industry group drivers are similar to what we saw during the balance of last year.
Not surprisingly our Aviation and Technical Solutions segments were challenged by the pandemic due to decreased global travel and limited site access for retrofit projects and educational facilities.
Education as the segment though grew top and bottom line during the quarter, which shows how well our team has adapted operationally to the hybrid learning system and Business & Industry and Technology & Manufacturing are still strong outperformers.
We've been able to offset COVID related revenue compression with higher margin Work Orders, EnhancedClean contracts and labor management.
We're now almost at the one-year mark since the start of the pandemic and I've just summarized our fourth consecutive quarter of strong results.
This sustained performance suggests that we have reached a level of consistency in our results and stabilization across our client portfolio.
Let me now provide some thoughts on where we believe the operating environment is headed, especially in light of our full year guidance.
Before I dive into what momentum to normalcy looks like in 2021, I want to underscore that normalcy does not imply less vigilance around virus protection.
Over the past several months, there have been countless news and scientific journals reminding us that COVID-19 and its after effects will continue to linger over the foreseeable future.
Many believe it will be a permanent fact of life with people getting regularly vaccinated similar to how we handle flu vaccinations.
We are so enthusiastic that vaccine rollouts are under way across the country.
Most importantly, the vaccines will save lives, but the rollouts will also lead to momentum back to work, school, travel and attending entertainment venues.
However vaccine rollouts have not been uniformed on a state by state basis nor have stayed policies on masking, public gatherings and other factors that impact infections and new cases.
These factors as well as the ongoing discovery of new variants highlight how societies need to respond to COVID-19 on an elevated level, will not end in the near-term.
This is why it's so critical for us to partner with our clients and assess their evolving needs and engage our expert advisory panel.
In B&I, the vaccines will spur momentum back to work, which for us means a return of more traditional janitorial work as well as the continuation of disinfecting given higher occupancy.
Currently, average occupancy across the country is approximately 15%.
We anticipate this could increase to 25% by Labor Day and grow to 50% plus through calendar year-end.
As clients begin to plan their returns, they are focusing on building trust in their facilities through health and safety protocols, rigor around cleaning, disinfecting and especially physical spacing will be incorporated into their plans.
For this reason, we do not anticipate a near-term reduction space utilization across commercial real estate, especially with Class A buildings and blue-chip clients.
For a sector like education, we believe the hybrid models will be in effect for at least the rest of the school year.
Soon, if not already, institutions will start planning for the fall 2021 semester with a push for more in-person learning in the K through 12 segment and higher ed.
How this unfolds could vary by region.
We should have a better line of sight when we speak to you after Q2 earnings.
And I'm sure as vaccine adoption continues to expand, there's probably no sector more poised for a robust volume recovery than Aviation.
We are definitely hearing about pent-up demand for personal travel and minimally a modest return of business travel.
For ABM, our business portfolio consists of both airlines and airports.
As airports were opened during the pandemic, operations in areas like terminal cleaning, transportation and shuttle service enabled us to mitigate reduced volumes on the airline side.
And ultimately, this diversification helped us breakeven last year, which was a major achievement.
On the airline side, current travel volumes are approximately 50% of pre-COVID levels.
Assuming vaccine rollouts gain traction, we believe we could see that grow moderately by year-end.
As both airlines and airports see increased traffic, the need for disinfection, virus protection and EnhancedClean will grow.
On an enterprise level, we conducted a Pulse Survey of approximately 200 clients last month that largely aligned to our own full year expectations.
Most respondents are expecting their facilities to more fully reopen and their companies to be endorsing reoccupancy in varying forms by September and they plan to continue taking multiple measures to protect spaces against COVID-19 as they reopen primarily in the areas of surface and air disinfection.
And even with the increase in flexible work schedules and work from home protocols, the vast majority of our clients say that they expect the total amount of space utilization to remain largely the same.
Now, the size of our survey, it's just a subset of our client base, but it supports what we are hearing more broadly as we communicate with our customers on their future plans.
It also speaks to our confidence in providing full year guidance today.
For fiscal 2021, we are introducing full year guidance of earnings per diluted share of $2.85 to $3.10 or $3.00 to $3.25 on an adjusted basis.
Our outlook for adjusted EBITDA margins is 6.6% to 7%, which compares to 6% last year.
We also expect to return to growth by the second half of this year and consistent demand for high margin Work Orders and EnhancedClean services through year-end.
We also anticipate retaining most of our labor arbitrage through year-end.
Our success will not translate to complacency.
Based on how the pandemic has changed our trajectory, we have been capitalizing on our momentum to elevate our brand and business.
At the end of February, we launched ABM's first national TV commercial.
It was a celebratory moment for the entire firm and we could not be proud of.
If you've not seen it on CNBC or Bloomberg TV, you can find it on our IR website today.
As we discussed last year, we are going to be investing in our clients, team members, and infrastructure.
We're focused on providing technology and data analytics capabilities to enhance client and team member experiences.
We are also prioritizing areas like talent development to further empower our people and create even more consequential relationships with our clients.
We are committed to building upon our strong culture and fostering a community of belonging where team members feel connected, valued, and inspired.
This reinforces our mission and vision as an organization and will have significant long-term commercial outcomes for us.
Internal initiatives such as our culture and inclusion council are dedicated to driving meaningful social change and cultivating an inclusive environment for everyone at ABM and we are taking active steps to turn this vision into reality.
I'm excited to share that we have entered into partnerships with organizations that are focused on building a more equitable society.
ABM has made a commitment to support the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Funds, the Hispanic Scholarship Fund, the Afterschool Alliance, and the Thurgood Marshall College Fund.
We are partnering with these organizations in an effort to make a difference in the areas of advocacy and civil rights, basic human needs, education, and workforce development.
We were just starting to discuss the coronavirus and its impact on the economy.
At that time I reiterated how our diversified portfolio coupled with our nimble operating model or hallmarks of our long-term success over the past 110 years.
Our results over the past 12 months has proven this beyond a doubt and with our solid liquidity and leverage, we are better positioned than ever to pursue growth and profitability that will unlock even greater shareholder value.
The dedication of the ABM team continues to fuel our performance quarter-after-quarter.
We have a culture like no other in our industry.
I'm proud that our results have been the greatest proof point of our resilience, agility and excellence.
Today marks my 100th day at ABM and my early impressions about the organization's drive to collaborate and execute have only grown.
As I continue to evaluate and assess our business needs, my main area of focus will be on helping to determine the appropriate enablers for both strategic growth and continuous improvement.
As I will discuss in more detail shortly, our strong results over the past several quarters coupled with our leadership position in the marketplace provides us with great opportunity to invest in our future growth potential.
I look forward to finalizing our thoughts on areas such as our internal investment strategy and sharing with all of you over the course of the year.
Now onto the results.
Revenue for the quarter was $1.5 billion, a decrease of 7.5% compared to last year.
The decrease in revenue reflects the continued impact COVID-19 has had across our business segments.
As a reminder, the pandemic had not yet impacted operations significantly until our second quarter last year and as such this quarter reflects the full year-over-year impact.
Partially offsetting this revenue decline was the ongoing demand for higher margin disinfection related Work Orders and EnhancedClean services.
Work Orders were particularly strong within our Business & Industry and Technology & Manufacturing industry groups.
On a GAAP basis, our income from continuing operations was $74.6 million or $1.10 per diluted share compared to $27.9 million or $0.41 last year.
In addition to our strong operational performance, the increase versus last year was driven by favorable development in prior year self-insurance adjustments.
We saw an $11.4 million benefit this year compared to $6.6 million in the first quarter of fiscal 2020.
Additionally, we saw our second consecutive quarter of current year positive insurance trend recording a benefit of approximately $3 million.
On an adjusted basis, income from continuing operations for the quarter increased to $68.3 million or $1.01 per diluted share compared to $26.2 million or $0.39 last year.
Our GAAP and adjusted earnings growth versus last year continued to be driven by significant increases in higher margin Work Orders and EnhancedClean services.
As our clients have incorporated health and hygiene services such as disinfection into their operation at higher levels, we continue to experience higher margin as a result of direct labor efficiencies, as our operators proactively manage the deployment of labor commensurate with COVID-19 related revenue decline.
Additionally, results also reflect one less working day, which amounted to labor expense savings of approximately $6 million.
Other items such as corporate discretionary expense, amortization, and interest were also lower compared to last year.
These results were partially offset by our planned infrastructure and organizational investment in areas such as IT.
However, I want to note that our investment spend for the quarter was approximately $4 million, which was lower than originally anticipated.
During the quarter, we generated adjusted EBITDA of approximately $124 million for a margin rate of 8.3% compared to $68.8 million or 4.3% last year.
I will now discuss our segment results.
As I referenced earlier, these results reflect the ongoing impact of COVID-19, which has resulted in revenue compression across our services.
As Scott discussed, our diversified segment structure has been a strength for us during the pandemic and each segment has been impacted by the pandemic in different ways, both positively and negatively.
In most cases though with perhaps the exception of Technical Solutions, our segment results reflect some combination of a mix shift toward higher Work Orders and EnhancedClean services.
Labor modulation on lower service demand as well as operational investments in areas such as EnhancedClean.
B&I revenue was $809.4 million, which was down just $11.5 million or 1.4% versus last year.
The parking and sports and entertainment businesses were the predominant drivers of the revenue decline due to the ongoing pandemic.
Almost entirely offsetting this decline was increased demand for higher margin Work Orders and EnhancedClean services at our national accounts and certain client in corporate sectors such as financial institutions.
Operating profit for the quarter reflected this more favorable mix of business resulting an $85.7 million or a margin of 10.6% compared to last year's $38.2 million and 4.7% respectively.
Technology & Manufacturing remains one of our most resilient segments.
T&M produced solid results for the quarter as it has since the beginning of the pandemic.
The segment reported revenue of $249.2 million, an increase of 6.5% versus last year with an operating profit of $26.9 million or a margin rate of 10.8%.
Work orders and EnhancedClean services drove demand for T&M particularly within the industrial manufacturing, pharmaceuticals, and high-tech sectors.
We also experienced growth with our logistic clients as we supported them during the peak holiday season.
Our Education segment grew revenues of $209.4 million with operating profit of $21.5 million or 10.2% margin.
We believe these results reflect some stabilization as schools have continued the hybrid learning model that has been in effect since the back half of last year.
Performance was primarily attributable to direct labor management due to modified staffing levels and other expense savings as well as demand for disinfection and COVID related Work Orders.
Looking ahead, we anticipate some reinstitution of a traditional selling season in 2021, which did not really exist last year due to the pandemic.
We continue to monitor how schools are going to evolve their approach to teaching in the current environment particularly as vaccination rollouts progress.
Aviation reported revenue of approximately $143 million with operating profit of $3.2 million.
As anticipated, this segment remain most impacted by COVID-19 and its effect on global travel.
The quarter saw a modest sequential increase in travel due to the holiday, but also reverted quickly due to lockdowns in areas such as the UK.
We continue to operate according to flight and passenger demand, providing higher tech services such as electrostatic spraying as we managed variable costs and expenses on a real time basis to match demand.
Finally, Technical Solutions reported revenue of $113 million versus $142 million last year.
This decline was driven by site access issues as clients such as an education continue to limit traffic into their facilities in order to protect administrative staff, teachers and students.
However backlog remains healthy above $150 million and we remain focused on churning through these projects as soon as possible.
Operating profit was $6 million or 5.3% on a margin basis.
Turning to cash and liquidity.
We reported positive cash flow during the first quarter despite this traditionally being a cash flow negative period.
This even includes the deferral of approximately $31 million in payroll taxes from the CARES Act.
We generated more than $45 million in cash flow from operations and free cash flow of approximately $39 million for the quarter.
Our strong performance enabled us to end this quarter with total debt including standby letters of credit of $851 million and a bank adjusted leverage ratio of 1.8 times.
Additionally, we ended the quarter with cash and cash equivalents of $378 million.
Given the consistency of our leverage and cash position over the last several quarters, we believe we have reached a point of stability both operationally and financially.
As a result, we are evaluating our capital allocation priorities.
In addition to organic investments in our business, we are also exploring the M&A market for potential targets to drive growth and build on our current momentum.
While remaining cognizant of our reentry into M&A, we will also consider share repurchases opportunistically.
We currently have approximately $145 million remaining in our authorized share repurchase program and we'll balance any potential activity with our M&A efforts to ensure maximum flexibility.
During the quarter we paid our 219th consecutive quarterly cash dividend of $0.19 per common share for a total distribution of $12.7 million to shareholders.
Now turning to our guidance outlook.
We are introducing a fiscal 2021 GAAP guidance outlook range of $2.85 to $3.10 and on an adjusted basis $3.00 to $3.25 per share.
Scott shared with you some great context from an operating perspective that supports our guidance.
So let me now provide some additional assumptions behind our guidance.
Given our performance during the first quarter, we believe revenue will continue to improve sequentially with a return to growth in the back half of the year.
And as growth improves and turn positive we will have to staff back up accordingly.
Therefore there may be a partial reduction in the level of labor efficiencies we have experienced over the past year, but make no mistake, we do expect to retain a portion of these savings based on new opportunities and labor management practices we have adopted during COVID.
And as it relates to higher margin Work Orders and EnhancedClean services, we do not anticipate a material slowdown in demand for the balance of the fiscal year.
We expect our investments to pick up throughout the remainder of the year as we support the strategic initiatives namely in our IT transformation.
On a year-over-year basis, we do expect an increase in corporate expenses for the year although timing may vary from quarter-to-quarter as you saw in the first quarter.
Additionally, as a reminder, we undertook furlough and expense reduction efforts during the third quarter of last year.
And as such, expect to see year-over-year increase in expenses as we have resumed a portion of those expenditures.
We are still in the planning and design phase of our technology roadmap and we will update you as we finalize our plans.
I'd also like to remind everyone that we will see an extra working day in Q2 and one less working day in Q3.
Each working day should represent approximately $6 million of labor expense similar to Q1.
We continue to expect an effective tax rate of approximately 30% for 2021.
This tax rate does not include discrete tax items such as the work opportunity tax credit and the tax impact of stock-based compensation awards.
At the end of December, WOTC was formally extended by Congress through 2025 and current estimate suggest a $5 million or $0.07 impact on 2020.
And finally, while we are not guiding to free cash flow, until we can finalize the impact of our tech transformation on capital expenditures.
I want to express my enthusiasm for the strong start to the year.
Given our strong cash flow performance to-date, we believe we'll be able to achieve a range above our historical $175 million to $200 million and look forward to updating you as we finalize our longer-term plan.
In closing, we're excited about our performance for the quarter as well as our outlook for the year and we look forward to updating you on our continued progress next quarter.

user
q1 adjusted earnings per share $1.01 from continuing operations.
q1 gaap earnings per share $1.10 from continuing operations.
for fiscal 2021, company expects gaap income from continuing operations of $2.85 to $3.10 per diluted share.
for fiscal 2021, company expects adjusted income from continuing operations of $3.00 to $3.25 per diluted share.

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