Harvard will announce a major new partnership with the City of Boston and several private and non-profit companies today, offering $5 million over the next five years towards expanding afterschool education programs in Boston.

Harvard is also expected to announce another community initiative on Monday, creating the Cambridge Harvard Summer Academy, which will offer summer classes for area high-schoolers.

The newly formed Boston After School for All Partnership--which will be announced at a press conference at noon today--will match the financial and education resources of the University with 11 other partners, including United Way of Massachusetts Bay, Liberty Mutual, Verizon, the Nellie Mae Foundation, and FleetBoston Financial.

The different partners together have committed to providing $23 million over the next five years towards expanding and improving after-school programs throughout Boston. This is the largest public and private partnership in the city's history.

"It's a great beginning for the city," Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino said yesterday. "All of these partners collectively is a great start, and shows a renewal of our commitment to afterschool education."

While some University funds will enter the general Partnership account, much of Harvard's effort will focus specifically on the newly-created Harvard After School Initiative. This program will work specifically in the neighborhoods of Allston/Brighton, Mission Hill and Fenway--all areas where Harvard has existing facilities and ongoing development.

Besides administering programmatic grants to afterschool programs in these communities, Harvard officials said they have also been working to focus University's academic resources toward the initiative.

Through the already-existing Program in Afterschool Education and Research (PAER) which runs through the Graduate School of Education, officials said they plan to work with afterschool programs to improve teacher training and curricula offered.