Nye County commissioners told a small crowd of school students Tuesday they'll have to wait for a county policy next month before expecting a donation for their trips, in light of snowballing requests.

At the last meeting in Tonopah Feb. 5, county commissioners agreed to pay tuition for three students to attend the People to People World Leadership Forum conference in Washington, D.C., and tuition for eight students from Round Mountain to attend the Close Up Program.

County Manager Ron Williams said commissioners already granted about $18,500 in requests, though he noted the county no longer gives the Nye County School District a flat $50,000 every year to use for student trips.

Under that scenario, the county would still have about $31,500 to spend, but Williams said the requests on Tuesday's agenda added up to $103,000 with more requests expected.

The requested funds Tuesday include:

$74,640 to send 40 Rosemary Clarke Middle School eighth graders to the Eastern Seaboard History Tour from Boston to Washington, D.C., in April;

$19,372 for 25 students from the Tonopah High School Aviation Club to attend a series of events in Hawaii in May;

$6,349 for a student from Pahrump Valley High School to attend the International Youth Leadership Forum in Beijing, China, in July;

$2,734 for a student from Manse Elementary School to attend the 2008 People to People World Leadership Forum in Washington, D.C., in September;

$300 for two students from Pahrump Valley High School to participate in the Hugh O'Brien Youth Conference in Las Vegas.

Commissioner Gary Hollis said the county manager needs to draw up guidelines on honoring requests for student trips. He said in the past commissioners only paid tuition, not travel expenses, which were raised by the students themselves.

But the cost of just the Eastern Seaboard History tour for the 40 middle school students, without travel expenses there and back, is $1,866 per student.

That tour will include visits to Bunker Hill, Paul Revere's Home, Wall Street, Ground Zero, the Empire State building, Broadway, Ellis Island, the Statue of Liberty, Independence Hall, the Smithsonian Museum, Mount Vernon, presidential and war memorials, Arlington Cemetery, a naval shipyard and a tour of the U.S. Capitol from representatives of U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev.

Williams said until now he's seen only a handful of students taking academic trips.

Commissioner Butch Borasky talked about setting a dollar amount and a time frame in which the students had to request funds.

While students dejectedly left the Bob Ruud Community Center about 10:15 a.m., to return to class following their local, civics lesson, members of the aviation club from Tonopah High School still made a slide presentation about past trips to Edwards Air Force Base and the plane graveyard in Mojave, Calif., by video conference.

The Hawaii trip is part of a 70 hour advanced placement history class in which the group will visit war memorials with special interest in the USS Nevada and Pearl Harbor. Tonopah contributions to the World War II effort would be recognized, including a Navy ship named after Tonopah native Frank O'Flaherty, a navy pilot killed in the Battle of Midway.

The farthest and most expensive trip, was a request by De'Ken Banks of Pahrump Valley High School for $6,349 in room, board and transportation to attend the 2008 International Youth Leadership Forum in China from July 5 to 13.

Banks is enrolled in the medicine career track in China. His tour includes visits to a traditional Chinese medicine academy, visits to hospitals and sports medicine facilities, an overview of the world's largest consumer, an eye on the 2008 Olympics and examples of the Chinese technology boom. A tour of Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City, the Great Wall, the 8,000 man terra cotta army in Xian, and a Chinese acrobatic show are included.