Pittsburgh Public Schools Superintendent Mark Roosevelt has proposed a more gradual start-up for a university-partnership school in the Hill District.

At a school board workshop last night, Mr. Roosevelt said he wanted to open the university school with only a ninth-grade in the fall, not grades six through nine as he initially proposed.

He wants to open the new school in the former Milliones Middle School building in partnership with the University of Pittsburgh.

The 140 or so students who would make up the university school's first ninth-grade class now attend elementary schools in the Hill District and other neighborhoods. All live in the feeder pattern of the Pittsburgh Schenley High School building, which Mr. Roosevelt has proposed closing at the end of this school year because of maintenance problems.

The university-affiliated school would grow to a school for grades six through 10 in 2009-2010 and eventually become a school configured for grades six through 12.

Miller PreK-8 in the Hill District would remain as is for 2008-09 and revert to a PreK-5 school the following year, when middle-grade students go to the university school.

Vann K-8 in the Hill District would remain as is in 2008-09 and close in 2009-10. Its middle-grade students would go to the university school or nearby Weil PreK-8. Vann's younger students would go to Miller or Weil.

Under Mr. Roosevelt's previous plan to open the university school with grades six through nine, Miller would have become a PreK-5 school and Vann would have closed next school year.

Derrick Lopez, the district's chief of high school reform, said Hill District residents sought a more gradual change in school designs. Also, he said starting the university school with one class will help build a positive school climate.

While Mr. Roosevelt has proposed locating the university school at Milliones, that is not set in stone. When school board member Heather Arnet asked whether the district had considered the possibility of renovating the Schenley building and placing the university school there, Mr. Roosevelt said, "there has been and there continues to be" study of that idea.