"Parents based in North London is looking for an exceptional and qualified instructor to support their smallest child on his first steps to becoming an British gentleman."
Upon seeing this post, you might readily skip the wording "beginning" as just figurative language.
Yet, it might be the most significant part of this distinctive employment listing, as it aims to recruit a tutor for a 12-month-old.
Many of submissions have already been received since the anonymous family published their request for the £180k-a-year tutor, who must be "an exceptional individual".
In recent few weeks, the listing has received attention in the media, with many questioning why?
Forward-Thinking Method
The CEO, head and founder of Tutors International, which is helping the family in their search, stated that notwithstanding initial scepticism, he found the idea "visionary", and "advanced".
When he spoke with the family, he mentioned they recognized the unusual nature of their requirement, and how young their son is.
But, they explained that they "were unwilling to delay any longer" to engage a tutor, as they had held off until their older child was five, and by that point "cultural bias had by then taken hold".
What exactly does the family indicate by "cultural bias"?
It's "all-encompassing", he responded. "How you eat, how you speak".
He stated the elder child had picked up "really subtle, unspoken signals" from the family, and had taken on their cultural ways. The family informed him they wished to avoid history to happen again with their infant.
The intention: To engage a UK tutor, who needs to speak with RP, to guide the baby from the very start.
Osmotic Learning
"A lot of the development at the beginning here is kind of osmotic," said Adam.
It's via this natural absorption that the family are hoping the child will pick up the British traits they want to cultivate.
Adam said the tutor must be somebody who attended "the appropriate educational institutions – the same kinds of schools as the family plan to send their son to".
"The educator simply needs to be the right kind of person, they'll be doing things they may not realize they're doing, just naturally," he commented.
Cost Not Relevant
The family told him the successful candidate should preferably also have understanding of or enthusiasm in equestrian activities, alpine skiing, artistic pursuits and musical activities so as to inspire the child in a diverse set of hobbies.
Furthermore though, he stated the family hoped the tutor to sign up the child on a range of lessons so the child would be "equestrian training and learning an instrument by the time they are approximately three years old".
In the family's perspective, helping their son develop into a "English gentleman" will lead to accomplishment and open doors.
"Considering the advantages and disadvantages of that, because it's undoubtedly a status symbol," he adds.
But, in spite of all this tutelage in "English culture", could the child absorb so-called cultural bias from the globally influenced family he is raised by regardless?
"Absolutely", replied the CEO. "The family know this could fail, but they've just taken the attitude of, 'we should try and let's go as early as we can', because the cost of it is not relevant," he explained.
Idealistic and Unrealistic
A number of in the education sector who express those concerns.
Another CEO, head and founder of an educational organization, who also offer private tutors, wrote that "the process of embracing two identities, or in fact, forming one's identity, is something that must be experienced personally, not engineered."
Peter wrote that he had relocated from the Far East to the UK at the age of childhood, and had been raised experiencing and living two backgrounds. He progressed to learn at a prestigious UK institution.
"The concept that a single person can act as a living vessel of English culture, a person who can possibly transplant the characteristics of a UK sophisticate to a 12-month-old child, seems to me idealistic and unrealistic," he commented.
"Based on my background, engaging a quintessentially UK tutor from early childhood will does not automatically produce the result they hope for.
"I did not have such a tutor, and yet I have been lucky enough to experience numerous of the opportunities they desire for their son."
He continued: "The truth is, self-identity should not be forced from the outside influences; it must be embraced, and it must come from within."
Buying Britishness
Of course, UK identity is something Adam hopes can be educated – and sold.
"In my view the fact that the international society holds us in this regard is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
