"A household located in North London seeks an exceptional and experienced instructor to guide their smallest child on his first steps to becoming an English gentleman."
Upon seeing this listing, you might easily miss the wording "beginning" as just a turn of phrase.
However, it may be the most significant part of this unique employment listing, as it seeks to recruit a tutor for a one-year-old.
Numerous of submissions have already been sent in since the unnamed family published their search for the highly paid tutor, who needs to be "someone very special".
In recent few weeks, the post has gained interest throughout the news, with numerous wondering why?
Forward-Thinking Method
Adam Caller, CEO and founder of Tutors International, which is supporting the family in their hunt, said that notwithstanding first skepticism, he viewed the concept "forward-looking", and "advanced".
When he spoke with the family, he noted they appreciated the unusual character of their request, and how immature their son is.
But, they stated that they "preferred not to postpone any longer" to hire a tutor, as they had waited until their firstborn was five, and by that stage "cultural influence had by then taken hold".
What exactly does the family mean by "cultural bias"?
It's "all-encompassing", the expert replied. "The way you eat, the manner you speak".
He explained the older sibling had absorbed "very nuanced, unspoken signals" from the family, and had taken on their cultural norms. The family told Adam they did not want the same situation to happen again with their new baby.
The intention: To engage a British tutor, who should speak with standard English accent, to influence the baby from the very start.
Osmotic Learning
"A lot of the development at the outset here is somewhat acquired indirectly," said the CEO.
It's via this osmosis that the family are expecting the child will adopt the English characteristics they aim to cultivate.
Adam noted the tutor needed to be somebody who studied at "prestigious academies – the same kinds of schools as the family plan to send their son to".
"The educator simply needs to be the appropriate candidate, they'll be carrying out things they aren't even aware they're doing, just naturally," he said.
Cost Not Relevant
The family told Adam the chosen tutor should preferably also have knowledge of or interest in riding, winter sports, creative fields and instrumental training so as to inspire the child in a wide range of passions.
More than that though, he said 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 around three years old".
In the family's view, helping their son develop into a "UK sophisticate" will bring about success and create opportunities.
"Considering the pros and cons of that, because it's definitely a status symbol," he notes.
Yet, in spite of all this instruction in "Britishness", might the child absorb so-called cultural influence from the globally influenced family he resides with in any case?
"Certainly", said the CEO. "The parents understand this may not work, but they've just taken the attitude of, 'why not attempt it and let's go as soon as we can', because the price of it is not a concern," he explained.
Idealistic and Unrealistic
Several in the tutoring industry who share these concerns.
Another CEO, head and founder of an educational organization, who provides individual instructors, wrote that "the development of becoming bicultural, or actually, forming one's identity, is something that must be grown into, not manufactured."
The expert wrote that he had emigrated from Asia to the UK at the time of childhood, and had been raised understanding and living both cultures. He progressed to learn at a prestigious UK institution.
"The idea that one individual can function as a representation of English culture, someone who can somehow impart the attributes of a UK sophisticate upon a one-year-old child, appears naive and unfeasible," he stated.
"From my perspective, engaging a typically English tutor from babyhood will not instantly create the outcome they hope for.
"I wasn't provided with such a tutor, and yet I have been lucky enough to enjoy numerous of the situations they aspire for their son."
He continued: "The fact is, cultural identity should not be dictated from the external environment; it must be selected, and it must be internally driven."
Buying Britishness
Certainly, English culture is something the expert thinks can be educated – and marketed.
"I think the reality that the world holds us in this regard is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
