Rural school superintendents said this week that sparse funding for their districts isn't getting enough attention from candidates running for governor.

Superintendents from about 20 rural districts met to draw attention to a funding system they say is broken. The meeting was led by Dave Polashek, the superintendent in Oconto Falls. He said his district is just one of many that has had to make hard decisions.

“Let's go back the last four to five years,” he said. “We have closed a school, we’ve discontinued drivers’ education, we’ve frozen salaries, we’ve increased class sizes.”

School budgets were cut before Gov. Scott Walker took office, but Polashek said that Walker made things worse by funneling $100 million to private voucher schools at the expense of public education. He said that tax cuts have also hurt rural areas because of highly valued vacation and recreational properties that disproportionately hurt small districts with declining enrollments.

When asked about the issue at a campaign stop, Walker said some educators are trying to “politicize” the issue.

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“Rural schools have had challenges for the last decade or so,” he said. “Because of transportation, because of declining enrollments. We actually put more money in.”

The last state budget included an extra $100 million in state aid. Polashek, however, said the money was distributed on a per-student basis.

“For the school district of Florence, out of that $100 million dollars they received an additional $104 dollars in state aid. For the Goodman Armstrong-Creek district, they had $38 of state aid.”

Democratic candidate Mary Burke has pledged to cut the voucher program and change the aid formula. Superintendent Polashek said she has been short on specifics.