Hoping to help a group of students left in limbo by the federal government, the Powell school board is expected to soon endorse the idea of having the northern part of Yellowstone National Park added to the Powell school district.

The Park County School District No. 1 board has scheduled a special 7 p.m. Tuesday meeting where they’ll vote on whether to support the expansion of the Powell district’s boundaries. Board Chairman Rob McCray expects the Powell board will show its support for the boundary change.

The expansion would not affect Powell’s students, schools or test scores; the Powell district would likely just serve as a conduit for state of Wyoming dollars to go to a Montana district.

At issue is how to pay for the schooling of about three dozen students who live in Mammoth Hot Springs in the northern part of Yellowstone.

The National Park Service paid for the students’ education in Gardiner, Mont., for decades. However, in February — more than halfway through the school year — park officials notified the Gardiner school district that they’d recently determined a 1970’s law actually prohibits them from paying for the students’ education and that they would not be paying the $500,000 owed for the current school year.

Yellowstone officials suggested the Gardiner district and Mammoth residents turn to the state of Wyoming for funding.

More than 100 Mammoth residents submitted a petition to the Park County Boundary Board — made up of the county commissioners, treasurer and assessor — in February asking to be included in a Wyoming school district.

The complex legal and jurisdictional issues have been under review by Park County and state officials since then. In the meantime, the Gardiner school board has been holding meetings on how to meet its $500,000 budget shortfall.

Park County Attorney Bryan Skoric and commissioners have been critical of the timing of federal officials’ notification of the problem — especially since the Park Service apparently discovered it months before publicly announcing it. A Yellowstone spokesman has said park officials made the information public as soon as they could.

Park County officials announced this week that they will meet on May 14 to consider whether to create a new district for the northern portion of Yellowstone National Park or put it in an existing district like Powell’s.

While the decision is up to the boundary board, Powell school board officials will likely vote Tuesday to say they would welcome the Mammoth students into their district.

“It’s not the kids’ fault that they were born in Yellowstone,” said board trustee Patty Wurzel at an April 22 board meeting.

“You’ve got a big group of kids that deserve a quality education,” McCray said in a Tuesday interview, noting they are Wyoming kids. He said the conversations shouldn’t be political, but about education.

Tuesday’s meeting will be held at the Powell School Administration Office at 160 N. Evarts St.