"A household located in North London wants to find an exceptional and qualified educator to guide their youngest child on his initial journey to turning into an English gentleman."
When reading this post, you might easily skip the term "initial stages" as mere figurative language.
However, it may be the crucial aspect of this unusual position posting, as it aims to hire a tutor for a 12-month-old.
Numerous of applications have since been sent in since the unidentified family published their request for the highly paid tutor, who must be "someone very special".
Over the last few weeks, the post has attracted notice in the press, with many asking why?
Progressive Approach
Adam Caller, CEO and founder of Tutors International, which is helping the family in their search, said that in spite of early skepticism, he found the idea "forward-looking", and "innovative".
When he consulted the family, he noted they understood the atypical aspect of their demand, and how early in age their son is.
But, they explained that they "preferred not to postpone 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 become established".
But what did the family refer to by "cultural predisposition"?
It's "all-encompassing", Adam responded. "How you eat, how you speak".
He stated the elder child had picked up "extremely delicate, body language" from the family, and had adopted their cultural habits. The family explained to him they wished to avoid the same situation to happen again with their new baby.
The intention: To engage a British tutor, who must speak with RP, to guide the baby from the very start.
Osmotic Learning
"A lot of the education at the start here is rather osmotic," stated the CEO.
It's via this natural absorption that the family are expecting the child will pick up the British traits they wish to instil.
The consultant said the tutor needed to be someone who studied at "the appropriate educational institutions – similar types of schools as the family aspire to send their son to".
"The tutor simply needs to be the suitable individual, they'll be carrying out things they may not realize they're doing, effortlessly," he commented.
Expense Not a Factor
The family explained to him the chosen tutor should ideally also have knowledge of or passion in horse riding, winter sports, creative fields and musical activities so as to inspire the child in a diverse set of interests.
More than that though, he explained the family hoped the tutor to register the child on a variety of classes so the child would be "pony-riding and starting an musical instrument by the time they are approximately three years old".
In the family's view, guiding their son develop into a "British gentleman" will bring about success and open doors.
"For all the rights and wrongs of that, because it's definitely a status symbol," he notes.
Yet, despite all this instruction in "UK identity", could the child adopt so-called cultural leaning from the multicultural family he resides with anyway?
"Yes", said he. "The family realize this may not work, but they've just taken the attitude of, 'we should try and we'll proceed as quickly as we can', because the expense of it is not a concern," he said.
Idealistic and Unrealistic
There are some in the education sector who express those doubts.
Another CEO, CEO and founder of Blue Education, who also offer individual instructors, commented that "the journey of becoming bicultural, or in fact, discovering oneself, is something that must be experienced personally, not engineered."
The expert explained that he had emigrated from the Far East to the UK at the period of seven, and had been raised experiencing and practicing dual heritages. He went on to be educated at the University of Cambridge.
"The concept that one individual can function as a embodiment of English culture, an individual who can possibly transplant the characteristics of a UK sophisticate onto a one-year-old child, strikes me as idealistic and impractical," he commented.
"Based on my background, engaging a distinctly UK tutor from babyhood will not necessarily create the goal they want.
"I never had that kind of mentor, and yet I have been fortunate enough to experience many of the experiences they desire for their son."
He added: "The truth is, self-identity should not be dictated from the external environment; it must be embraced, and it must come from within."
Buying Britishness
Naturally, Britishness is something the expert believes can be taught – and commercialized.
"In my view the situation that the international society views us in this regard is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
