When finished, the new Brentwood Elementary School will feature dedicated space for support classrooms, wider and more accessible hallways, and a rooftop playground.
Construction of the new school, located at 30 West Willock Road, is scheduled to be ready for the first day of school Sept. 8.
It brings together all Brentwood students from Kindergarten through fifth grades for the first time in more than a century.
The district’s two elementary schools, Moore and Elroy, have been in use for more than 100 years and will close this summer.
“It’s been over 100 years since we had our kids under one roof,” said Superintendent Amy Burch. “It’s a new tradition for us.”
Plans
The new school is on the former site of the St. Sylvester church school and convent, Burch said, and is located across the street from the Brentwood Police Department and less than half a mile from Brentwood Middle-High School. Construction began in October 2024.
Building capacity is 650 students.
The four-story building has a geographic theme, Burch said.
“When we were talking to the teachers about what they wanted to see in a new building, they really related to the nature aspect and said, we want a place where students can go and be calm and want to come to school,” she said.
At night, windows into a stair tower will be illuminated and people on Brownsville Road will be able to see that each floor is a different color — with yellow representing the first floor, green in the middle floors and blue representing the top floor. The color-coded school floors will also help students navigate the building, Burch said.
A topographical map of Brentwood will be located near the main entrance.
The ground floor will have first grade classrooms, and dedicated art, music and band rooms. The first floor will have kindergarten classrooms and an open floor plan STEAM and Media Center. The second floor will have second and third grade classrooms and the third floor will have fourth and fifth grade classrooms.
“We have done multiple surveys,” Burch said when asked about feedback for the new facility. “We actually collaborated with the Children’s Museum, they came and led several sessions with us. We actually took the students’ ideas for the courtyard, and for the rooftop. The end result is what the students came up with.”
The courtyard will include a basketball hoop, four-square, turf playing area, climbing wall and shade.
The 5,500-square-foot roof playground will be surrounded by an 8-foot fence that can’t be climbed, Burch said. No balls will be allowed on the roof.
Officials say the roof will be among the top 10 highest locations in Allegheny County, with the top of the stair towers at 1,300 feet above sea level.
“We didn’t have enough area on the bottom, so we were creative,” Burch said. “There are examples out there, but it’s not very common in Allegheny County.”
Pittsburgh CAPA, located downtown, also has a rooftop playground.
Finances and security
Costs for the new facility come in at just under $39 million, said Jeff Nelson, district spokesman.
“The board, from the very beginning of this project, planned for tax increases,” Burch said. “The last tax increase that we needed to implement occurred last year, so we are not anticipating any further tax increases for this building project.”
The district will also use $5 to $6 million in cash built up over the years to help cover construction.
“We were really looking for a balanced approach in how we were going to finance this project,” Birch said.
The district also worked on a “multi-layered approach” to security when planning the building, with thick walls, glass and coating on the glass, Burch said. A security professional will greet visitors at the entrance and visitors will be in an isolated area before gaining access to the building.
“We want to welcome people, but we also need to keep kids safe, so we’ll put them through a vetting process before they’re granted access to the building,” Burch said.
The courtyard and playground are out of the public’s view, she said.
Building a school in 2026
Burch noted the new school was planned with the students’ needs in mind. There are dedicated spaces that include ESL, speech and language, counseling and occupational and physical therapy classrooms.
Brentwood has a growing immigrant population, Burch said. The district’s English Language Learner population was 12.3% last school year, steadily increasing from 5.3% in the 2020-21 school year.
Last school year, 17.8% of Brentwood students were special education students.
The new facility will also offer a sensory room, Burch said.
“We have other students that need assistance with emotional regulation,” Burch said. “They’ll be able to go to that space as well and be safe and now that they can recenter themselves before joining the classroom again. Those were things we could not do in the original buildings.”
Officials say wider hallways and door entrances, and an elevator in the classroom wing, improve accessibility at the new facility compared to the previous schools.
Bleacher seating in the gymnasium will seat about 270 and accommodate six wheelchair locations on the floor. The cafeteria has reinforced steel, and a separate water and plumbing system that could serve as a storm shelter for the entire school population, if needed.
What’s next for Moore and Elroy?
Moore opened in 1916 and Elroy opened in 1921.
“The district is a tight knit community,” Burch said. “Tradition is very important. When we started this project, we wanted to hear from the community. We wanted to get their input, but we got to a point where they also acknowledged that there were certain limitations that we couldn’t overcome if we kept the original buildings. So we wanted to honor the traditions and the past.”
Burch said one example of keeping with tradition is moving the grandfather clock at Moore to the new school.
Nelson said the district has plans to commemorate Elroy and Moore.
Officials have set up times for staff, current and former students and community members to do short video interviews about their memories.
The district is working with the Brentwood Historical Society to collect old photos from the public.
Both schools will have open houses in May so the community can tour the buildings.
The district plans to market and sell the old schools, Burch said.
“The board has been very specific, they want to add to the community of Brentwood,” she said. “They want to see the schools added to the tax rolls to help and they envision that happening through residential housing — apartments, condos, if a developer wanted to build single family homes, that could be an option as well. Residential is the direction they want to go.”