Vice mayor Dennis Benzan, left, brought schoolchildren together with astronaut Douglas H. Wheelock at a November event at the Community Art Center. (Photo: Dennis Benzan)

Whether it’s a move to convert the city’s empty Foundry building into a marketplace of science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics businesses and organizations, pressure on Kendall Square companies to open their doors to residents or ways to encourage students to excel in those fields, so-called STEAM issues have become a major theme in Cambridge life.

Two committees of the City Council and their combined working group are inviting the community to hear the results of months of research, goal-setting and determination of best practices around STEAM-related workforce development and “issues of access and equity in the innovation economy.”

The group’s recommendations will be sent to the full council and forwarded to the city manager for his consideration and actions, said Pamela M. Rosario Perez, an aide to vice mayor Dennis Benzan.

The event – the Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics Summit – is to be led by Benzan, co-chairman of the Economic Development and University Relations Committee, and councillor Nadeem Mazen, co-chairman of the Neighborhood and Long Term Planning, Public Facilities, Arts and Celebration Committee.

Benzan has been focused on connecting residents with higher-paying innovation industry jobs with as much fervor as he has advocated construction of housing for moderate- and lower-income households in Central Square, signaling it even as he campaigned for office in August 2013. “We need to encourage corporations to view our neighborhoods as their first, best partners, and in turn we must educate all our citizens, young and old alike, to imagine companies such as Novartis, Microsoft and Google as places where they might have successful careers – not just as buildings in whose shadow they walk,” he said.

The summit is at 5:30 p.m. Dec. 10 in the Sullivan Chamber City Hall, 795 Massachusetts Ave., Central Square. For information, contact Perez at [email protected].