"Parents located in North London wants to find an exceptional and qualified instructor to support their youngest child on his first steps to becoming an English gentleman."
Looking at this post, you might readily skip the phrase "initial stages" as simple a turn of phrase.
However, it may be the most important element of this unusual employment listing, as it seeks to find a mentor for a one-year-old.
Many of applications have already been sent in since the unnamed family published their search for the £180k-a-year tutor, who must be "a uniquely qualified person".
During the past few weeks, the post has attracted notice across the press, with many asking why?
Forward-Thinking Method
A tutoring expert, head and founder of an education consultancy, which is assisting the family in their quest, explained that in spite of initial scepticism, he found the plan "visionary", and "progressive".
When he met the family, he said they understood the unconventional character of their requirement, and how young their son is.
But, they stated that they "preferred not to postpone any longer" to engage a tutor, as they had held off until their firstborn was five, and by that point "cultural bias had already taken hold".
What exactly did the family refer to by "cultural predisposition"?
It's "everything", the expert responded. "The way you eat, the way you speak".
He said the firstborn had picked up "very nuanced, unspoken signals" from the family, and had taken on their cultural habits. The family informed him they wished to avoid history to happen again with their infant.
The plan: To engage a UK tutor, who needs to speak with standard English accent, to guide the baby right from the beginning.
Osmotic Learning
"Much of the education at the start here is kind of acquired indirectly," said the expert.
It's through this osmosis that the family are expecting the child will acquire the UK customs they aim to cultivate.
He noted the tutor needed to be someone who studied at "prestigious academies – similar types of schools as the family hope to send their son to".
"The tutor just has to be the suitable individual, they'll be performing things they aren't even aware they're doing, simply by nature," he said.
Expense Not a Factor
The family informed Adam the chosen tutor should ideally also have understanding of or enthusiasm in riding, alpine skiing, creative fields and instrumental training so as to shape the child in a wide range of passions.
More than that though, he stated the family hoped the tutor to register the child on a selection of lessons so the child would be "equestrian training and starting an instrument by the time they are around three years old".
In the family's minds, assisting their son become a "English gentleman" will bring about accomplishment and open doors.
"Taking into account the rights and wrongs of that, because it's definitely a class statement," he comments.
However, notwithstanding all this tutelage in "English culture", might the child pick up what is termed cultural leaning from the multicultural family he is raised by regardless?
"Certainly", said he. "The family realize this may not work, but they've just taken the view of, 'let's give it a go and we'll proceed as quickly as we can', because the expense of it is not a concern," he said.
Overly Optimistic
Several in the tutoring industry who express these concerns.
Peter Cui, CEO and founder of a tutoring service, who provides personal educators, commented that "the development of becoming bicultural, or indeed, discovering oneself, is something that must be experienced personally, not engineered."
He explained that he had moved from China to the UK at the time of seven, and had been brought up experiencing and living both cultures. He progressed to be educated at a prestigious UK institution.
"The notion that an individual can serve as a living vessel of UK identity, an individual who can somehow transplant the qualities of a UK sophisticate upon a 12-month-old child, strikes me as optimistic and unrealistic," he wrote.
"Based on my background, employing a typically UK tutor from infancy will will not instantly create the goal they desire.
"I wasn't provided with such a figure, and nevertheless I have been lucky enough to experience many of the situations they hope for their son."
He added: "The reality is, self-identity should not be forced from the external environment; it must be embraced, and it must originate internally."
Buying Britishness
Naturally, UK identity is something the CEO hopes can be educated – and commercialized.
"I think the reality that the world holds us in this respect is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
