"A family residing in north London is looking for an exceptional and skilled instructor to support their smallest child on his first steps to becoming an English gentleman."
Upon seeing this listing, you might readily miss the term "first-steps" as simple a turn of phrase.
However, it may be the most important aspect of this unique position posting, as it attempts to find a mentor for a one-year-old.
Many of applications have since been received since the anonymous family published their request for the £180k-a-year tutor, who needs to be "a uniquely qualified person".
During the past few weeks, the listing has gained notice in the press, with numerous asking why?
Progressive Approach
A tutoring expert, CEO and founder of Tutors International, which is supporting the family in their quest, said that notwithstanding first scepticism, he found the concept "far sighted", and "progressive".
When he spoke with the family, he said they recognized the unusual nature of their requirement, and how immature their son is.
But, they explained that they "preferred not to postpone any longer" to engage a tutor, as they had postponed until their older child was five, and by that point "cultural bias had already taken hold".
What exactly does the family indicate by "cultural leaning"?
It's "everything", Adam responded. "How you eat, how you speak".
He explained the firstborn had adopted "very nuanced, non-verbal cues" from the family, and had taken on their cultural ways. The family told Adam they wished to avoid the same situation to happen again with their younger child.
The strategy: To engage a English tutor, who must speak with standard English accent, to shape the baby right from the beginning.
Subtle Influence
"A great deal of the education at the start here is rather osmotic," explained the expert.
It's through this natural absorption that the family are expecting the child will acquire the British traits they wish to instil.
He said the tutor had to be an individual who went to "prestigious academies – similar types of schools as the family aspire to send their son to".
"The tutor simply needs to be the right kind of person, they'll be performing things they don't even know they're doing, simply by nature," he added.
Expense Not a Factor
The family informed Adam the successful candidate should preferably also have knowledge of or interest in riding, skiing, artistic pursuits and musical activities so as to shape the child in a diverse set of passions.
Additionally though, he explained the family desired the tutor to register the child on a range of classes so the child would be "pony-riding and picking up an instrument by the time they are around three years old".
In the family's view, helping their son grow into a "UK sophisticate" will result in accomplishment and provide access.
"For all the advantages and disadvantages of that, because it's definitely a social class indicator," he notes.
But, notwithstanding all this instruction in "English culture", might the child absorb so-called cultural influence from the globally influenced family he lives with regardless?
"Yes", answered he. "The parents understand this could fail, but they've simply adopted the perspective of, 'we should try and let's go as quickly as we can', because the cost of it is irrelevant," he explained.
Impractical
A number of in the tutoring industry who share these doubts.
Another CEO, chief executive of Blue Education, who supplies personal educators, stated that "the development of becoming bicultural, or in fact, becoming oneself, is something that must be lived into, not designed."
He wrote that he had moved from China to the Britain at the period of childhood, and had been brought up understanding and living both cultures. He continued to study at the University of Cambridge.
"The concept that a single person can serve as a representation of UK identity, someone who can possibly transfer the characteristics of a UK sophisticate to a infant child, appears naive and unfeasible," he wrote.
"Based on my background, employing a typically English tutor from infancy will not necessarily create the outcome they want.
"I did not have that kind of mentor, and yet I have been lucky enough to experience several of the experiences they aspire for their son."
He continued: "The truth is, personal identity cannot be dictated from the outside; it must be embraced, and it must be internally driven."
Purchasing UK Culture
Naturally, Britishness is something the expert thinks can be taught – and commercialized.
"I believe the reality that the international society regards us in this respect is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
