The Cambridge Friends elementary school, to be opened in September by the Friends Meeting of Cambridge, will serve "a desperate need for another independent school in the area," David M. McClelland, professor of Philosophy and cochairman of the project said last night.

McClelland said that many people, especially members of the Harvard and MIT faculties, were looking "for independent schools in the area for their children, and that there is subsequently great pressure on those existing."

Although the school will enroll boys and girls of all races and religions, it will have a Quaker philosophy and will be dedicated to developing in the child "an inner discipline free from reliance on outer authority," McClelland said.

The school will charge a tuition starting at $500 for kindergarten pupils. Initially the Quaker institution will teach only kindergarten through the fourth grade.

If the funds can be obtained and land suitable for a school plant and athletic fields can be found in the Cambridge area, the school may eventually extend through high school grades, McClelland said.