BUCKLAND, MA – Leaders of school districts with fewer than 1,000 students, or which serve towns with fewer than 10 students per square mile, have been invited to the Mohawk Trail Regional School on March 23 to discuss forming a Massachusetts Rural Schools Association.

The association is to address issues that school systems in densely populated regions don’t face.

Superintendent Michael Buoniconti invited 45 school superintendents of 65 rural school districts to this meeting — and all have small school populations in large rural areas.

“Some (superintendents) are in charge of three, even four, small districts,” said Buoniconti, who heads the Mohawk and Hawlemont regional school districts. “We’re all dealing with flat state aid and small class sizes. Mohawk is not unique in this — and in finding ways to survive.”

He said the purpose of this new educational group is to “represent interests peculiar to rural districts” that are not represented by either the Massachusetts Association of School Superintendents or the Massachusetts Association of Regional Schools.