Do we have to pay top dollar for school superintendents?
The AJC has a companion piece to its weekend story on how few systems are cutting their highest-level central office folks. The latest story talks about how well paid school superintendents are in metro districts.
The real question is whether districts have to pay these high salaries to attract and keep good superintendents. They all claim they do, that this a market-driven decision. (The Regents say the same thing about the salaries they offer college presidents.)
According to the AJC:
At least four local superintendents earn more than the vice president of the United States and one earns nearly as much as the president.
As school districts face unprecedented budget cuts and collective layoffs of more than 1,500 teachers, superintendent compensation remains hefty, even with recent decreases.
The highest-paid superintendent in the metro area is Gwinnett’s Alvin Wilbanks, who earns $382,819, according to the Gwinnett school district. Wilbanks actually will make less than before because of furlough days.
Last year, Wilbanks earned $387,934, according to the open.georgia.gov Web site, which tracks government spending. He oversees 158,329 students and the largest school district in the state. In contrast, President Barack Obama makes $400,000 per year, according to the White House Web site.
“I know that’s a sensitive issue,” said Stuart Bennett, Georgia Association of Educational Leaders executive director, speaking of superintendents’ compensation. “But it’s a job with a lot of responsibility and a lot of pressure. Superintendents have a tremendous responsibility on them. They are CEOs.”Gwinnett school district’s total budget is $1.7 billion with 22,000 employees.
“The fact is they are a large company,” Bennett said. “That might seem to be a high salary for education, but it’s relatively meager for a company that size.”
A superintendent’s compensation is not easy to pinpoint. The compensation is spelled out in the contract, but amendments and other changes are hard to track. When The Atlanta Journal-Constitution asked metro Atlanta school districts to disclose their superintendent’s compensation, pay was broken down into different pieces or not at all. Some districts included retirement benefits, cellphone stipends and cashed-out, unused vacation time when calculating a superintendent’s compensation. Others did not.
Beverly Hall, Atlanta Public Schools superintendent, earned $344,331 last year, the school district said. She is the second-highest paid superintendent in the metro area and runs one of the smallest school districts with 48,696 students. Hall’s compensation includes a $78,115 bonus, a cellphone stipend of $1,200 and a car allowance of $666.
In 2008, Hall earned $352,097. That included an $82,000 bonus, $1,200 for the phone, $588 for the car and $5,000 in miscellaneous. Hall’s current compensation is smaller because her bonus decreased by $4,000 and she did not receive the $5,000 in unspecified pay.
Hall’s bonus fluctuates from year to year depending on whether she meets her performance targets, which are partially based on student achievement, Atlanta school district spokesman Keith Bromery said.
“She didn’t meet all of them,” Bromery said. “We set a high bar here for student performance. She can’t achieve 100 percent of them in most instances.”
Hall’s compensation was higher in records kept by open.georgia.gov than the school district listed: $353,710 in 2008 and $389,314.56 in 2009. Those figures came from payroll data supplied by the school district to the state auditor.
Hall’s compensation is about six times more than the average Atlanta teacher’s salary of $57,740. Wilbanks’ compensation is seven times more than the average Gwinnett teacher’s salary of $55,795.
In DeKalb County, former Superintendent Crawford Lewis earned $287,992. That’s more than Vice President Joe Biden, whose reported earnings were $276,463.
Clayton County’s superintendent earns about $276,629, still more than Biden. Fulton County’s superintendent earns $260,483, including $13,675 in a retirement allowance, $9,600 in car allowance and $12,000 in expense allowance.
Cobb County’s superintendent, who runs the second-largest district in the state, earns $216,697, which includes a car allowance. That’s more than Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue, who earned $139,339, according to open.georgia.gov.
Cobb is reeling from potentially the deepest classroom cuts in the metro area, with 579 teaching positions and 56 para-professionals among the job losses.
Cobb superintendent Fred Sanderson took a 2 percent pay cut and five furlough days, and his compensation dropped from $224,494 to $216,697 this year, district spokesman Jay Dillon said.
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176 comments Add your comment
the prof
May 24th, 2010
2:09 pm
PBM isn’t black. I know who he is and he is a white person trying to bait you.
Proud Black Man
May 24th, 2010
2:10 pm
Who am I then? Your futile attempts at clairvoyance amuse me.
SeaIsland
May 24th, 2010
2:14 pm
Average income for a family of four (4) in America: $52,000. Why is a superintendent, any public servant, worth more?
In the shadow of financial Armageddon an outraged populace is beginning to stir.
V for Vendetta
May 24th, 2010
2:16 pm
HS tchr,
I agree. Perhaps I should have clarified that “upwardly mobile” doesn’t have to be linked to your title. I would prefer to stay in the classroom, too. I like it much better in here.
Yelp,
Yes and no. I’m thinking of something done locally, on a school-by-school basis. To my knowledge, National Boards does not have a PLU or degree requirement. I’m also assuming (and I know what people say about assuming . . .) that the degrees and PLUs would be far more relevant than they are today–i.e., reputable schools and applicable professional training, not degree mills and pie-in-the-sky BS
V for Vendetta
May 24th, 2010
2:16 pm
what is with the filter today!?
younger_teacher
May 24th, 2010
2:23 pm
Why should superintendents make more than a governor or the vice president? Why should they be making almost as much as the president?? This makes no sense.
Doris M
May 24th, 2010
2:41 pm
Based on the performance of Georgia students, all the superintendents are over paid, especially Beverly Hall.
Felicity
May 24th, 2010
2:49 pm
Fred is over paid! I’m a parent who has no confidence in his ability. I’ve witnessed him not correcting administrators who don’t follow state and federal laws. The state will issue decisions against Cobb, and at the next board meeting he issues praise. He’s unfit to lead. Mandatory National Certification as a requirement for advancement and the online degrees are a joke. Administrators will hold a PhD, but has never and will never publish. Forget Obama’s salary, they are earning more than GaTech professors.
Casuality of RIF
May 24th, 2010
2:51 pm
Government in education….socialism? Let’s go back to teachers doing just that…teach instead of jumping hoops to do all the nonsense required by the powers that be. Reciting standards to student EVERY DAY does not add to their knowledge base other than knowing what the state thinks they should know. Posting standards on my wall wastes paper that my students could use to learn to read and write. Posting student work on the wall with teacher commentary takes time that a teacher should use to tutor a struggling student. RTI’s are another big waste of time, documentation of what I am already doing is keeping me from doing it.
As far as administrators, they aren’t CEO’s. I need them to bring some effective discipline policies and actions to the classroom so all students can learn. That is worth whatever they make…if they are effective anyway.
Sid Camp
May 24th, 2010
3:29 pm
Lets be honest;
Many administrators are those who flee the classroom because they can’t teach but they can earn a degree which somehow qualifies them for a management position. Thus the inherent failure of education.
Instead of the best managers, we get the best students. Instead of the best superintendents, we get the good ole boy network.
As for this person referenced in this piece. He is not worth the time or energy. He doesnt care about us, his teachers or his students. He only cares about being right and being in control. He is Mr. Potter from its a Wonderful life but without the charm.
oldtimer
May 24th, 2010
3:30 pm
When we are done being grossed out by superintendant’s high pay, we should examine principals, human resources, and every other postion. There are way too many overpaid people. Seems once someone is out of the classroom, the pay sky rockets.
Angela
May 24th, 2010
3:32 pm
@GSU Student,
Andrew Thomas made a good point by asking you those questions. While you are asking why don’t teachers step up, you might want to take a deeper interest in if you will be able to make a living at all. The Bushes are living quite well. The question is will you live as a peaseant or comfortable.
Also, just for the record the superintendents are not who does the work it is the teachers. Believe me the super would not have a job if we did not come to work and perform our duties. We as classroom teacher not only make the super look good but all of the other administrators.
BlueDawg
May 24th, 2010
3:34 pm
Presidents, Governors, Vice-Presidents are all constitutional officers. Their pay is determined by the respective legislatures. Superintendants are hired by school boards who have to compete for chief executives, which is what they are on the open market. You want a great executive to run your school system, it is going to cost money. That is one of the quirks of living in a free market society.
The risk of going back to direct election of Superintendnats is that a politicians first job is always to get re-elected. Do you really want that mentality driving policy for your local BOE?
DD
May 24th, 2010
3:51 pm
In Marietta City School, the superintended made $200+K in 2009, but no one else made more than $130K. It is definitely a much smaller system, but they seem to be doing pretty well, relatively speaking. I know a lot of people talk about small systems merging, but I wonder if a smaller system has its advantage – Marietta has only 3 Deputy/Assistant superintendent.
DD
May 24th, 2010
3:53 pm
As long as the superintendent is appointed, they will have to offer then $200K salaries. If you make it an elected position, they can limit the pay at a lower level. Of course, then we risk people who wants to get “power” and consider the superintendency as a stepping stone to a higher level political office.
Proud Black Man
May 24th, 2010
4:06 pm
@ Angela
“The question is will you live as a peaseant or comfortable.”
“Also, just for the record the superintendents are not who does the work it is the teachers.”
“We as classroom teacher not only make the super look good…”
Please quit tea (insert the name that cannot be mentioned). Your frontal lobes are about gone!
the prof
May 24th, 2010
4:06 pm
Shall I post your name, address, and phone number on this blog???
Sam
May 24th, 2010
4:40 pm
She doesn’t get a bonus unless she meets testing goals – how about not getting paid until you do?! WHY DO YOU NEED A $600 CAR ALLOWANCE? CAN’T AFFORD ONE ON 300K? In some counties, teachers are losing their houses and lives and these fat cats are no better than the jerks on wall street.
Hank Rearden
May 24th, 2010
5:11 pm
It’s just not very Christian for Georgia Republicans to crap on our kids like this.
Do they think throwing a ten in the plate on Sundays buys them the freedom to give others the finger the rest of the week?
@ GSU student
May 24th, 2010
5:28 pm
“Superintendent pay reflect their responsibilities. ”
I agree. But with responsibility comes accountability. I don’t think there is a parent/taxpayer in the metro area that wouldn’t agree that superintendents who are good stewards of our money should be adequately rewarded. We taxpayers pay the bills. I pay thousands and thousands a year in property taxes, sales tax, and income tax, and my child is not even in the school system anymore.
Parents/taxpayers don’t ask for much. We just expect for every child to have:
A reasonably sized classroom with a competent, well compensated teacher and access to abundant and cutting edge technology and science equipment.
In DeKalb Schools, we have a $1,000,000,000 (yes – a billion dollar) budget (that’s actual money we have coming in this year) and 97,000 students. That’s over $10,300 a year per student. We have the money to educate our students, but not to become a “jobs program”. Currently, in DCSS we have 8,500 admin and support, but only 6,800 teachers and we are eliminating teacher positions. We have declining scores, increasing class sizes and awful customer service. The buck stops with the superintendent, and he/she must be held accountable. Compensation is one of the most effective ways to bring about accountability. Another is to relieve the superintendent of his/her position.
I do not believe DeKalb citizens are the only taxpayers experiencing this “jobs program” mentality although our situation may be the most egregious. I have looked at the numbers of admin and support for other systems, and it is apparent that most metro systems have superintendents that have much to be accountable for as well.
Rewarding poor performance is not fiscally prudent. When you’ve worked for a few years (I spent 30 in education and 8 in the corporate world), you’ll realize that the bottom line really is what makes the wheels go round.
Dr. John Trotter
May 24th, 2010
5:55 pm
Superintendent Salaries Are Outrageous!
By John R. Alston Trotter, EdD, JD
Most of Georgia’s superintendents (and in other states also) aren’t worth metaphorically wasting a bullet on them. That was a metaphor. You have heard someone say, I am sure: “He ain’t worth shootin’.” Well, my grandfather would say: “He ain’t worth wasting a bullet on.” Now that I have cleared up the fact that I am not violent nor do I ever advocate violence, let me now say this rather categorically: Most superintendents have to eat a lot of “do do” to get in the position of being “vetted” by the good ole boy system that is somewhat self-perpetuating and incestuous here in Georgia — and I am sure in other states as well. Since they had to eat so much “do do” to be where they needed to be in order to be tabbed as the next “savior” for whatever school system is desperate (like when Atlanta hired Beverly Hall in 1999 — heck, she had made a complete mess of New Jersey!), these booger-eaters and butt-kissers then tend to think that they deserve these whopping salaries from the public trough. At best they are just the top educrat on the educational totem pole, but they do not interact with any students. They issue top-down, heavy-handed commands as if this is some type of effectual “reform” (this is truly a worn-out word which I detest). All — let me repeat…ALL — so-called educational “reforms” which have been touted and ballyhooed through years have panned out to be abject failures, and I challenge anyone to defy this statement, especially these wannabe State Superintendents.
Yes, these school superintendents’ salaries (and benefits) are way out of line. Like I said, most of these creatures aren’t worth their salt when it comes to running a school system. I am sorry that you have to hear the blunt truth from me, but I don’t apologize nor vacillate one scintilla. They are the problems, not the “saviors.” Someone needs to stand up and say that Alvin Wilbanks, Beverly Hall, Edmond Heatley, Cindy Loe, Fred Sanderson, Crawford Lewis (and his interim replacement), et al., are naked as a jaybird. The educational emperors (and they do act like emperors, don’t they?) are naked. Why are people so afraid to point this out? I commend the Atlanta Journal-Constitution for shedding some needed light on the superintendents’ outrageous salaries and the concomitant behemoth bureaucracies which the superintendents establish to serve them, not the students. (c) MACE, May 25, 2010.
Fed up former teacher
May 24th, 2010
5:57 pm
What exactly does J. Alvin do? He has croonies or rather area superintendents over each cluster. I worked for Gwinnett for several years and I have never seen the man in person. He doesn’t visit the schools. He has never been a classroom educator. He worked for Gwinnett Technical school. He doesn’t know the first thing about what a kindergarten student needs or how they learn. I wish someone wouldn’t be so fearful of this corrupt school system and do some investigating.
GSU Student
May 24th, 2010
6:10 pm
Yelp – Yes I cared to read the articles and comments that followed. I have read many comments where teachers have bashed administrators for their pay. Great teachers and great administrators create a conducive enviroment for learning. The notion that a principal does nothing but twiddle his/her thumbs is crazy to me. Tax payers have a right to question salaries and I truly believe that. But the tx payers seems to be outraged at teachers or administrators making significant money.
GSU Student
May 24th, 2010
6:14 pm
Yelp- Teachers are not asking for their salaries to be cut to protect the jobs of their colleagues. Teachers pay are being cut(unjustly) due to things beyond their controls. Teaching is a fine profession and I stem from a family that has two principals and a professor in the family. I believe in education and I believe in teachers, but I am not a believer or cutting someones pay in which they earned solely because people believe teachers and administrators are second rate.professionals.
Support Staff
May 24th, 2010
6:28 pm
In Cobb County, the RIF criteria was that you were employed for less than 2 years, or had been in your current position for less than 2 years (regardless of how long you had been a county employee). The best part about this is that one of our Asst. Superintendents has been with the county for less than two years, and his wife moved to her new “position” (i.e. created just for her) in central office last year. Oh, and her husband is the boss of her boss. Both of them make over $100,000, and yet the 2 year criteria did not apply to them. The central office positions cut in Cobb had nothing to do with admin. There are various departments that fall under the central office umbrella, and those departments must determine who counts as a “cut” position. For example, 6 school social workers were eliminated, so that is 6 less “central office” employees.
GSU Student
May 24th, 2010
6:28 pm
Angela – You must give superintendents some credit.The superintendents I have come into contact with write grants for their districts and allocate resources so teachers can go to development classes and learn research based teaching strategies that are proven to be successful in the classroom. All superintendents aren’t perfect, just as all teachers aren’t perfect.I do believe that teachers are the backbone of a school system. Classroom teachers are the most important persons to students in a school system because they interact with the students on a daily basis. Teachers and administrators are both part of helping students be successful. A school without a strong administration that backs its teachers is not worth two cents
GSU Student
May 24th, 2010
6:31 pm
Andrew Thomas – Yes I pay property taxes and income tax. Does my tax bracket dictate whether or not I get to have an opinion?
Andrew Thomas
May 24th, 2010
6:47 pm
@GSU Student
So are you a student or not?
HStchr
May 24th, 2010
6:57 pm
Blue Dawg- elected supers may not be the answer, but I do recall as a young teacher that they were more connected to and concerned about voters (parents, teachers, community members). The job was usually given to someone more involved in the community. You didn’t have someone swooping in from across the country who had no idea what the community was about and a lot less corporate layering of management to shield them from the actual constituents they served.
Yes they want to get reelected and thus are more concerned about system success. As it is now, even if they are awful and screw up royally, the system has to pay out the contract to get rid of them. That really bothers me.
another Hall parent
May 24th, 2010
6:57 pm
An elected superintendent would fix a lot of problems. What do we need to do to get this ball rolling?
Fed up former teacher
May 24th, 2010
7:08 pm
GSU student ummm our superintendent makes 13,000 dollars less than our President of the United States. He is only responsible for 1 single school system of roughly 149,000 students. Our president is over 50 states, health care, wars, bombs, our troops etc. Do you not see the big picture? Wilbanks shouldn’t make what he does especially when we have area superintendents to over see the Gwinnett school clusters.
HStchr
May 24th, 2010
7:24 pm
another Hall parent: contact your legislators and spread the word. That’s how we ended up with appointed supers. At the time, it seemed like a good way to reduce the politics of the position and ease often contentious relationships with the BOE. I was in Clayton county in those days and quickly got a bad taste for the whole process. Suddenly we had supers who were impossible to contact, who created layer upon layer of uselss positions for their friends, and who had to be paid more and more to be competitive with other systems and business. At one point, we were paying TWO contracts for supers who failed miserably. Like many systems, Clayton also began hiring supers with absolutely NO educational background, which only made matters worse. It is just not right that the superintendent, a taxpayer funded job, should not be directly, via votes, connected to the people he/she serves. We don’t pay teachers or anyone else based on business models, so why should the super be paid that way? Why should Beverly Hall get bonuses that teachers, who actually did the work, have no access to? Unfortunately, we are a long uphill battle away from getting the legislature to realize that the current system isn’t working and needs to be changed.
d
May 24th, 2010
7:43 pm
Fed up — for what it’s worth (and I attended GCPS when Wilbanks was promoted) Gwinnett Tech was part of the Gwinnett School System…. so basically they promoted a “principal” to be the superintendent. Compared to the crook he replaced, I’ll say that was an improvement….. but his time has long passed in my opinion. I worked for GCPS for a few years but left for DeKalb — a decision I don’t regret at all. Despite our problems, I’ve been allowed to teach a bit more — put the pretty pictures up on the wall the people making too much money want to see and go about my business helping students.
Anne Keegan
May 24th, 2010
7:58 pm
Take into consideration that a large # of tax paying citizens relieve the public school systems in favor of private education. There is no ’superintendent’, thus we save a bundle there. Perhaps if the county systems were abolished and returned to their neighborhoods, we could hire the amount of staff needed for our schools and actually rise to the distinction of higher than 49 or 50th in the union!
john konop
May 24th, 2010
8:04 pm
GSU Student
Looks like Andrew Thomas caught GSU Student!
Dr. Trotter tells the truth
May 24th, 2010
8:05 pm
While PAGE and GAE twiddle their thumbs and heap praise and accolades on educrats that time proves deserved neither, Dr. Trotter tells the truth.
Maybe that’s why so many who criticized him in the past turned tail and ran, when he challenged them by name to an open formal debate.
Lee
May 24th, 2010
8:16 pm
Wilbanks makes twice the money as his next in line. You cannot tell me that one of his direct reports could not step in and do just as good a job (or bad, depending on your perspective) as he.
Years ago, school systems began the practice of conducting national searches for superintendents. It began a merry-go-round of superintendents punching their ticket and always working for the next bigger piece of the pie.
My pet peeve, if you have an assistant superintendent and (s)he is not capable of stepping into the role of super, demote them and get someone who can. Fill the super positions from within and forego the national talent searches.
Hank Rearden
May 24th, 2010
8:35 pm
Dr. Trotter panders to teachers — that’s his schtick. He’d Throw his mother under the bus for a buck. Just another low-life lawyer who couldn’t make it in the real world.
Let's find out
May 24th, 2010
8:35 pm
Let’s cap superintendent pay at $125k for the next decade, and really see if student achievement drops in half.
Dr. Trotter tells the truth
May 24th, 2010
8:38 pm
There’s a long line of people who want to criticize Dr. Trotter. And what do they all have in common? When challenged to engage Dr. Trotter in an open, formal debate they all turned tail and ran.
But if people want to keep on arguing for the status quo, as represented by GAE and PAGE, by all means, continue to argue for education as it currently stands in Georgia.
Dekalbite
May 24th, 2010
8:42 pm
“An elected superintendent would fix a lot of problems. What do we need to do to get this ball rolling?’
Change the GA constitution for one thing.
Testimony
May 24th, 2010
9:04 pm
One look at the line of degenerates Trotter ‘represents’ reveals him to be the bottom feeder he is.
d
May 24th, 2010
9:13 pm
Just one note about the appointed superintendent thing, as Dekalbite states, we gotta change the Constitution. The Constitution was approved by Georgia voters, so we did that to ourselves. The only concern I have with electing a superintendent is that if we do it for a typical 4-year term is we’ll have politicians who are more interested in keeping their jobs than actually doing their jobs, or if they get voted out (or term-limited out), we’ll end up with people like our wonderful governor who doesn’t have to answer to anyone and we all see how many wonderful things Houston County is getting while the rest of the state suffers.
Hmmm
May 24th, 2010
9:38 pm
Complicated jobs require talented people. And, most often you get exactly what you pay for. This idea that we can have great leaders or teachers without reasonable compensation is baloney.
Can you argue that Hall’s getting almost three times Wilbanks’ salary on a per pupil basis was money well spent–sure! Should the Dekalb County Superintendent have been fired–yes. At 61% of their combined salaries and in charge of an additional 10,000 children, I would say say Mr. Willbanks is a bargain.
Are some systems top heavy with central office administration–yes. Should people be upset that schools in some counties cheated–yes! Will schools have to tighten belts like everyone else during the downturn–certainly.
However, Mr. Willbanks was just recognized as one of the top superintendents in the country while Gwinnett County received a national top honor as a Broad Finalist. Lumping all superintendents together is just plain dumb.
HStchr
May 24th, 2010
9:47 pm
d- not if we push for constitutional changes to make them answerable to voters. A super represents a much smaller population than the governor, and if we term limit them and require access to voters, we can circumvent a good deal of the “I’m here and you can’t do anything about it” mentality. I was very much in favor of appointing supers before the national talent searches began. At the time, the elected supers were often in direct conflict with the board and not always required to work with them. We can rewrite the laws/regulations to limit that and require consensus with and approval from BOE. We could require more voter input via special votes called for from the public, especially where money is concerned. It would take some detailed legislative work, but if enough people call for it, it can be done.
Hmmm, Hmmm
May 24th, 2010
10:29 pm
Well Hmmm perhaps the Broad Award isn’t the barometer it’s cracked up to be.
Look at past Broad Award finalists.
Houston-Home of Rod Paige and the “Houston Miracle”
Gwinnett-Home of Falsified Discipline Data
Atlanta-Home of the E-Rate Scandal, a major discipline scandal on par with Gwinnett, and possibly the biggest cheating scandal in Georgia’s history
If these are indicative, as the Broad Award would lead you to believe, of the top urban school systems in the country, imagine the horror shows that are the worst urban school systems in the county.
Trey
May 24th, 2010
10:47 pm
Where is the Pay Czar for the school system…?
Treat em like any other company that isn’t producing, fire them and bring in somebody who can operate the schools at at lower cost with higher outcomes. Having said that, I guess you should hold the teachers accountable first. I smell union issues somewhere with the teachers or admins…
Trey
May 24th, 2010
10:49 pm
If student enrollment drops when you lower their salaries can my kids get a voucher?
@ trey
May 24th, 2010
11:37 pm
No. When the superintendent and his administration tell teachers how to teach (in DCSS there are scripted teaching programs – teachers actually teach from a script – Springboard $1,400,000 and America’s Choice $8,000,000), and if teachers teach the way they have been told they have to teach, reading the script and giving the worksheets they have been told to give to the students and follow exactly what has been prescribed by their supervisors, then they should not be held accountable.
GSU Student
May 24th, 2010
11:38 pm
Andrew Young and John Konop — You two must be one in the same. Because each of you love to comment on each others IDEAS and attempt to jump on others. Both of you have flawed logic. So since I am a student I cannot own property or pay income taxes? Some people have worked hard to get where they are and I am one of them. I’ve had an eBay store since my senior year in high school and I purchased a house near the college I attend versus paying outrageous rent to stay in a apartment. So yes I am a students and yes I pay taxes and yes I believe (Andrew Young and John Konop) are the same persons. If you don’t want to discuss the merits of my statements then why write for my attention at all? Anything else I need to school you two(one) on , I’ll be here for a mintue