"A household located in the northern part of London seeks an extraordinary and skilled tutor to guide their youngest child on his initial journey to growing into an English gentleman."
Looking at this post, you might readily skip the term "initial stages" as just figurative language.
But, it may be the most significant part of this distinctive job advert, as it attempts to find a tutor for a 12-month-old.
Many of submissions have now been submitted since the anonymous family posted their request for the highly paid tutor, who has to be "a uniquely qualified person".
Over the last few weeks, the advert has received attention across the news, with several wondering why?
Forward-Thinking Method
A tutoring expert, head and founder of an education consultancy, which is helping the family in their search, stated that notwithstanding initial skepticism, he considered the idea "far sighted", and "progressive".
When he spoke with the family, he mentioned they understood the unconventional nature of their requirement, and how young their son is.
However, they explained that they "didn't want to wait any longer" to get a tutor, as they had held off until their firstborn was five, and by that point "cultural conditioning had already set in".
But what did the family mean by "cultural bias"?
It's "comprehensive", the expert answered. "The manner you eat, the manner you speak".
He explained the older sibling had absorbed "extremely delicate, non-verbal cues" from the family, and had adopted their cultural ways. The family informed him they hoped to prevent history to happen again with their younger child.
The strategy: To engage a British tutor, who must speak with standard English accent, to influence the baby right from the beginning.
Natural Absorption
"Much of the development at the outset here is kind of acquired indirectly," said the CEO.
It's by means of this subtle influence that the family are aiming the child will acquire the British traits they wish to instil.
Adam explained the tutor needed to be somebody who went to "prestigious academies – the same kinds of schools as the family aspire to send their son to".
"The tutor must be the suitable individual, they'll be carrying out things they aren't even aware they're doing, effortlessly," he commented.
Expense Not a Factor
The family informed Adam the successful candidate should ideally also have knowledge of or passion in horse riding, alpine skiing, artistic pursuits and musical activities so as to influence the child in a broad spectrum of passions.
More than that though, he explained the family hoped the tutor to sign up the child on a variety of lessons so the child would be "pony-riding and picking up an instrument by the time they are approximately three years old".
In the family's perspective, assisting their son develop into a "UK sophisticate" will bring about accomplishment and create opportunities.
"For all the advantages and disadvantages of that, because it's certainly a status symbol," he notes.
However, despite all this tutelage in "English culture", could the child pick up so-called cultural bias from the international family he lives with in any case?
"Certainly", replied he. "They realize this may not work, but they've merely embraced the view of, 'let's give it a go and let's go as soon as we can', because the cost of it is not a concern," he said.
Overly Optimistic
A number of in the private teaching field who share these reservations.
An education leader, chief executive of Blue Education, who supplies private tutors, wrote that "the development of adopting dual cultures, or indeed, becoming oneself, is something that must be lived into, not engineered."
The expert explained that he had emigrated from China to the Britain at the age of childhood, and had been educated knowing and living both cultures. He continued to study at Cambridge University.
"The notion that a single person can act as a representation of Britishness, a person who can somehow impart the characteristics of a English gentleman onto a 12-month-old child, seems to me optimistic and unrealistic," he stated.
"In my experience, employing a distinctly UK tutor from babyhood will does not necessarily create the outcome they hope for.
"I wasn't provided with such a tutor, and however I have been lucky enough to experience numerous of the opportunities they desire for their son."
He added: "The reality is, personal identity cannot be dictated from the external environment; it must be embraced, and it must originate internally."
Purchasing UK Culture
Of course, UK identity is something the expert hopes can be taught – and marketed.
"I believe the situation that the global community regards us in this respect is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
