"Parents located in North London is looking for an remarkable and experienced tutor to assist their youngest child on his first steps to growing into an English gentleman."
Upon seeing this listing, you might readily skip the phrase "first-steps" as simple an expression.
However, it may be the crucial part of this unique job advert, as it aims to hire a mentor for a 12-month-old.
Many of responses have since been sent in since the unnamed family posted their call for the £180k-a-year tutor, who needs to be "an exceptional individual".
During the past few weeks, the listing has received notice across the news, with many asking why?
Progressive Approach
A tutoring expert, head and founder of an education consultancy, which is supporting the family in their hunt, stated that in spite of initial scepticism, he considered the idea "forward-looking", and "progressive".
When he met the family, he mentioned they appreciated the unusual aspect of their demand, and how immature their son is.
Nevertheless, they stated that they "preferred not to postpone any longer" to get a tutor, as they had waited until their elder sibling was five, and by that age "cultural bias had already become established".
What precisely did the family refer to by "cultural leaning"?
It's "comprehensive", the expert replied. "The manner you eat, the manner you speak".
He explained the older sibling had absorbed "really subtle, unspoken signals" from the family, and had adopted their cultural habits. The family told the consultant they did not want history to repeat itself with their infant.
The plan: To engage a UK tutor, who should speak with standard English accent, to shape the baby from the very start.
Osmotic Learning
"Much of the education at the start here is rather osmotic," stated the expert.
It's through this natural absorption that the family are expecting the child will acquire the British traits they wish to cultivate.
He noted the tutor needed to be somebody who attended "prestigious academies – comparable categories of schools as the family hope to send their son to".
"The instructor just has to be the right kind of person, they'll be doing things they may not realize they're doing, simply by nature," he commented.
Cost Not Relevant
The family explained to him the chosen tutor should ideally also have familiarity of or interest in horse riding, skiing, creative fields and musical activities so as to shape the child in a wide range of hobbies.
More than that though, he explained the family hoped the tutor to enrol the child on a variety of courses so the child would be "horseback riding and picking up an tool by the time they are about three years old".
In the family's perspective, helping their son develop into a "UK sophisticate" will lead to achievement and open doors.
"Taking into account the pros and cons of that, because it's definitely a social class indicator," he comments.
Yet, notwithstanding all this instruction in "Britishness", would the child absorb so-called cultural bias from the international family he lives with regardless?
"Certainly", said the CEO. "They understand this might not succeed, but they've simply adopted the view of, 'we should try and let's go as quickly as we can', because the cost of it is not relevant," he stated.
Impractical
Several in the private teaching field who have similar doubts.
An education leader, CEO and founder of a tutoring service, who provides personal educators, stated that "the process of adopting dual cultures, or actually, forming one's identity, is something that must be experienced personally, not designed."
The expert noted that he had emigrated from China to the Britain at the time of childhood, and had been brought up knowing and embodying dual heritages. He progressed to learn at a prestigious UK institution.
"The concept that one individual can act as a representation of UK identity, a person who can in some way impart the characteristics of a British gentleman onto a 12-month-old child, seems to me naive and unfeasible," he wrote.
"In my experience, engaging a quintessentially English tutor from early childhood will does not instantly create the result they want.
"I wasn't provided with that kind of mentor, and however I have been lucky enough to experience many of the situations they hope for their son."
He continued: "The truth is, cultural identity can not be forced from the outside influences; it must be chosen, and it must be internally driven."
Buying Britishness
Of course, English culture is something Adam believes can be taught – and marketed.
"I believe the reality that the global community views us in this respect is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
