Audio- Besendorfer three days after tornado- Funnel clouds have silver linings

Less than three days after the Joplin Tornado, at least one Joplin R-8 administrator was already to spend millions of dollars to make her ideal school a reality.

An audio recording of a May 25, 2011, meeting at what is now the Joplin High School 9-10 Center obtained by the Turner Report and Inside Joplin shows that Assistant Superintendent Angie Besendorfer was already prepared to spend the $1 million plus needed to buy laptops for every Joplin High School student, though this was weeks before the United Arab Emirates made its $500,000 pledge, with a promise to make it one million once the district was able to match the pledge.

"Let's do the 1 to 1," Besendorfer told teachers who had come to the building for an update about their school district and their jobs.

Whatever you want, Besendorfer told those who were jam packed into the room (two meetings had to be held that afternoon), you will be able to get because of the tornado.

It was at that point where the assistant superintendent used an early version of the phrase she has continued to use since that time.

The district was able to find "lots of silver linings," she said. "tornado clouds, funnel clouds have silver linings."

Though the teachers and students might find themselves in buildings that are not ideal since theirs were destroyed by the tornado, Besendorfer said, "while we build the ideal school."

Besendorfer's statement came approximately 68 hours after 161 people had been killed by the EF-5 tornado, the most devastating tornado to hit the United States in six decades. It was made at a meeting where a number of the teachers (including this one) were hunched over their laptops trying to locate students through Facebook to make sure they and their families were all right.

The statement came only a few moments after Besendorfer told teachers to make sure to notify the administration about any funerals that were to take place.