University President Lawrence H. Summers joined Cambridge Mayor Michael A. Sullivan at the Cambridge Ringe and Latin School (CRLS) last Friday to celebrate Harvard’s most recent contribution to a group of local educational organizations.

The morning’s events—which included singing and dancing presentations from Cambridge school children—centered on the Cambridge-Harvard Summer Academy, an enrichment program for CRLS students and one of 28 Cambridge educational organizations to receive a total of $500,000 in Harvard grants this summer.

Sullivan said Harvard’s sponsorship of local education reflected a successful cooperation between the University and the city.

“It’s about a mutual beneficial interest. It’s about our future and it’s about the University’s future,” he said. “I want to thank Harvard for stepping to the plate, not just with a cash piece.”

The Summer Academy program, through which 425 CRLS students receive six weeks of academic instruction from veteran teachers and students at the Graduate School of Education, serves both the Cambridge public school system and Harvard’s teacher-training program. The initiative, presently in its third year of operation, began as a five year commitment. But Summers said Harvard’s support for the program will probably extend past 2005.

“I certainly hope that we will not only renew but expand our commitment to the program,” he said.

The Summer Academy has seen considerable success to date, more than doubling in size over the past three years.

Deputy Superintendent of Schools Carolyn Turk said the program’s small-group teaching style offers students an additional opportunity to master academic material and to develop their community skills.

“This is exactly the kind of contact and experience that young people need to have,” she said.

Shortly after arriving at CRLS, Summers and Sullivan toured the school’s campus with an entourage of colleagues, stopping at two Summer Academy classes in progress.

The two leaders walked into a chemistry class playing a mock game show called “Balance This.” The students, Summers and the mayor mulled over an equation for the synthesis of magnesium nitrate.

As students handed their responses to the instructor on folded sheets of paper. Summers walked to the front of the room and discussed applications of chemistry in industry. Sullivan also emphasized the importance of mastering basic chemistry.

“To live and work in Cambridge today, this is the sort of thing you have to know,” he said.

Both leaders reiterated the importance of science several times over the course of the morning.

Their tour of the high school came in the wake of longstanding controversy over the city’s weak record for public education. Low test scores, falling enrollment rates and wide variation in performance have become a black mark on the city’s public education system during an already tumultuous period of administrative turnover.