Topeka ? Officials with the Menninger clinic will consider a medical school partnership next month that could result in the psychiatric institute leaving Topeka.

Menninger and Bear Stearns & Co. are preparing to make a proposal at the Dec. 4 trustees meeting in Kansas City, Mo., said clinic spokeswoman Nancy Trowbridge.

Thirty-two institutions, including Kansas University, signed confidentiality agreements to be part of the selection process. A steering committee narrowed the list to five and then visited those campuses.

Plans to move the financially troubled clinic fell through in August 2001 when Menninger announced it could not come to terms with the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston and the Methodist Health Care system.

Menninger officials said at the time that the clinic would remain at its 242-acre campus in northwest Topeka, but that it would continue to look for an affiliation with a major medical school.

Menninger is seeking a university partnership because its leaders believe that is the best way to integrate education and research with its mission of providing mental health care.