"A household located in North London wants to find an remarkable and qualified tutor to support their most junior child on his first steps to becoming an British gentleman."
When reading this advertisement, you might easily skip the wording "beginning" as simple a turn of phrase.
But, it may be the crucial part of this unusual position posting, as it aims to recruit a teacher for a 12-month-old.
Many of submissions have now been submitted since the unnamed family posted their call for the £180,000 per year tutor, who must be "someone very special".
During the past few weeks, the listing has attracted attention in the media, with numerous asking why?
Progressive Approach
A tutoring expert, head and founder of a global tutoring firm, which is helping the family in their hunt, explained that despite first scepticism, he found the idea "visionary", and "innovative".
When he consulted the family, he said they recognized the atypical character of their requirement, and how young their son is.
Nevertheless, they stated that they "were unwilling to delay any longer" to engage a tutor, as they had held off until their older child was five, and by that stage "cultural influence had already taken hold".
What precisely does the family mean by "cultural leaning"?
It's "comprehensive", he responded. "How you eat, how you speak".
He said the older sibling had adopted "very nuanced, body language" from the family, and had taken on their cultural ways. The family told the consultant they did not want the same situation to recur with their younger child.
The strategy: To bring in a UK tutor, who should speak with Received Pronunciation, to guide the baby right from the beginning.
Osmotic Learning
"A lot of the development at the outset here is somewhat osmotic," said the CEO.
It's via this osmosis that the family are hoping the child will acquire the UK customs they wish to instil.
He noted the tutor had to be an individual who went to "prestigious academies – comparable categories of schools as the family hope to send their son to".
"The instructor simply needs to be the right kind of person, they'll be doing things they aren't even aware they're doing, simply by nature," he commented.
Cost Not Relevant
The family told the expert the successful candidate should preferably also have familiarity of or passion in equestrian activities, skiing, the arts and music so as to inspire the child in a wide range of passions.
More than that though, he said the family desired the tutor to enrol the child on a variety of classes so the child would be "horseback riding and starting an instrument by the time they are about three years old".
In the family's perspective, assisting their son become a "UK sophisticate" will lead to success and create opportunities.
"For all the rights and wrongs of that, because it's definitely a class statement," he notes.
But, notwithstanding all this tutelage in "UK identity", might the child absorb so-called cultural influence from the international family he resides with in any case?
"Absolutely", said the CEO. "The family realize this might not succeed, but they've simply adopted the perspective of, 'we should try and we should start as quickly as we can', because the expense of it is not a concern," he stated.
Idealistic and Unrealistic
There are some in the education sector who share those reservations.
Another CEO, CEO and founder of an educational organization, who provides personal educators, commented that "the process of becoming bicultural, or actually, discovering oneself, is something that must be experienced personally, not manufactured."
Peter wrote that he had relocated from the Far East to the United Kingdom at the time of 7 years old, and had been educated knowing and practicing dual heritages. He progressed to be educated at Cambridge University.
"The concept that a single person can serve as a living vessel of UK identity, someone who can somehow transfer the characteristics of a English gentleman to a infant child, seems to me optimistic and impractical," he wrote.
"In my experience, employing a quintessentially UK tutor from early childhood will will not automatically create the result they want.
"I never had that kind of mentor, and nevertheless I have been lucky enough to live numerous of the situations they hope for their son."
He stated: "The truth is, self-identity should not be dictated from the outside influences; it must be selected, and it must originate internally."
Acquiring Englishness
Certainly, UK identity is something Adam believes can be taught – and sold.
"I think the fact that the international society views us in this regard is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
