trying to query a database - vb.net

Question

I'm having a bit of a problem populating a collections class with the values from the database. Everytime I loop through a record in the WHILE DR.READ loop, the last record over writes all the other items in the collection. My returnVal collections has several of the same items despite the loop showing each individual record being added into returnVal. Thanks for any help.
Public Shared Function getStuff(ByVal sb As StringBuilder) As System.Collections.Generic.List(Of Minutes)
Dim returnVal As New System.Collections.Generic.List(Of Minutes)
Dim conn As New SqlConnection
Dim cmd As New SqlCommand
Dim dr As SqlDataReader
conn.ConnectionString = System.Configuration.ConfigurationManager.ConnectionStrings("ConnectionString").ConnectionString
cmd.Connection = conn
cmd.CommandText = sb.ToString
Try
conn.Open()
dr = cmd.ExecuteReader
While dr.Read
Dim _minutes As New Minutes
_minutes.Minutes = dr("minutes")
_minutes.MinutesId = dr("minutesId")
returnVal.Add(_minutes)
End While
Catch ex As Exception
Dim _minutes As New Minutes
_minutes.Minutes = ex.ToString
_minutes.MinutesId = 0
returnVal.Add(_minutes)
End Try
conn.Close()
Return returnVal
End Function
This is my Minutes Class
Imports Microsoft.VisualBasic
Public Class Minutes
Private Shared _minutesId As Integer
Private Shared _minutes As String
Public Property MinutesId() As Integer
Get
Return _minutesId
End Get
Set(ByVal value As Integer)
_minutesId = value
End Set
End Property
Public Property Minutes() As String
Get
Return _minutes
End Get
Set(ByVal value As String)
_minutes = value
End Set
End Property
Public Shared Function getStuff(ByVal sb As StringBuilder) As System.Collections.Generic.List(Of Minutes)
Return MinutesDA.getStuff(sb)
End Function
Public Shared Function modify(ByVal sb As StringBuilder) As String
Return MinutesDA.modify(sb)
End Function
Public Shared Property Id() As Integer
Get
Return MinutesDA.Id
End Get
Set(ByVal value As Integer)
MinutesDA.Id = value
End Set
End Property
Public Shared Property Index() As Integer
Get
Return MinutesDA.Index
End Get
Set(ByVal value As Integer)
MinutesDA.Index = value
End Set
End Property
End Class

Answer 1

The problem is that the fields in the Minutes class are shared. There will be one instance of the fields shared by all instances of the class. Remove the "Shared" from the fields:
Private _minutesId As Integer
Private _minutes As String
This will store the values for each instance separately

Answer 2

To confirm you are getting new values or the same value try this:
Dim i as Integer
i = 0
While dr.Read
Dim _minutes As New Minutes
_minutes.Minutes = dr("minutes")
' _minutes.MinutesId = dr("minutesId")
_minutes.MinutesId = i
i = i + 1
returnVal.Add(_minutes)
End While
After this you can see if the MinuteId is different.
N.B. In VB6 you had to set the _minutes to Nothing at the end of the loop to get a new instance. However I wouldn't have thought that would be true in VB.NET