The city school board will discuss aspects of the Pittsburgh Schenley High School debate in private Monday before a public meeting on the topic.

Pittsburgh Public Schools officials yesterday pushed back the start of the board's Education Committee meeting to 7 p.m. and scheduled an executive session for 5:30 p.m.

Solicitor Ira Weiss said he understood concern about the board having a private discussion about a hotly debated topic.

However, he said the board has a right to hear about labor-relations issues -- such as employee transfers -- that could arise from the board's decision on whether to close the landmark Oakland building. Mr. Weiss also said he planned to speak to the board about legal issues related to the question of whether students could remain in the building during a renovation project.

He said the executive session won't include the same presentation that Superintendent Mark Roosevelt will give during the public Education Committee meeting. Nor, he said, will the private meeting involve an extensive board discussion about the Schenley building.

In October, Mr. Roosevelt proposed closing Schenley at the end of the school year, saying the district couldn't afford more than $64 million to address asbestos and other maintenance problems. He proposed moving the students to other schools, including an International Baccalaureate school and a university partnership school that he proposed creating.

When parents, students and other Schenley supporters complained, Mr. Roosevelt suggested closing the Schenley building at the end of the school year but allowing the remaining students -- this school year's ninth-, 10th- and 11th-graders -- to stay together at another building until their classes graduate. He'd also phase in the new schools.

Mr. Roosevelt later sought additional time to study Schenley's condition, and the board directed him to make recommendations at Monday's Education Committee meeting.

Jen Lakin, a Point Breeze parent critical of Mr. Roosevelt' plans, said she wasn't surprised to learn about the private meeting because, "I don't think we ever hear anything until it's been decided."

Board President Bill Isler said the executive session is "really not about Schenley. It's about the potential personnel issues and real-estate issues dealing with everything we're doing."

Mr. Isler said he was referring to the domino effect that a decision about the Schenley building could have on other school buildings.

He said the Education Committee meeting specifically was scheduled so the board could be informed of Mr. Roosevelt's recommendations on Schenley. The executive session, he said, won't undercut that.

"There are too many board members who would not allow it, including me," he said.

School supporters have been circulating e-mails saying they fear a renovation of the Schenley building could be tied to a tax increase or the loss of teachers' jobs.