"A household located in north London is looking for an extraordinary and skilled educator to support their youngest child on his initial journey to growing into an British gentleman."
When reading this listing, you might easily miss the wording "initial stages" as mere a turn of phrase.
Yet, it may be the crucial part of this distinctive employment listing, as it seeks to hire a mentor for a infant.
Hundreds of responses have now been received since the unidentified family posted their request for the £180,000 per year tutor, who has to be "a uniquely qualified person".
During the past few weeks, the post has attracted attention across the news, with many questioning why?
Forward-Thinking Method
Adam Caller, head and founder of an education consultancy, which is assisting the family in their quest, stated that notwithstanding early scepticism, he found the idea "far sighted", and "innovative".
When he met the family, he said they recognized the unconventional character of their request, and how young their son is.
But, they clarified 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 influence had already taken hold".
What precisely does the family indicate by "cultural predisposition"?
It's "everything", he responded. "How you eat, the way you speak".
He explained the older sibling had absorbed "really subtle, body language" from the family, and had taken on their cultural norms. The family told Adam they did not want the same situation to recur with their new baby.
The intention: To bring in a British tutor, who should speak with RP, to guide the baby from day one.
Natural Absorption
"A great deal of the learning at the start here is kind of osmotic," said the expert.
It's through this natural absorption that the family are expecting the child will acquire the British traits they want to cultivate.
He explained the tutor had to be an individual who attended "the appropriate educational institutions – comparable categories of schools as the family aspire to send their son to".
"The tutor just has to be the right kind of person, they'll be performing things they aren't even aware they're doing, effortlessly," he said.
Expense Not a Factor
The family told the expert the successful candidate should ideally also have familiarity of or interest in riding, skiing, artistic pursuits and instrumental training so as to inspire the child in a diverse set of interests.
More than that though, he said the family wanted the tutor to sign up the child on a selection of courses so the child would be "pony-riding and learning an instrument by the time they are about three years old".
In the family's view, guiding their son grow into a "British gentleman" will bring about accomplishment and create opportunities.
"Considering the rights and wrongs of that, because it's undoubtedly a social class indicator," he adds.
However, despite all this tutelage in "English culture", would the child pick up alleged cultural influence from the globally influenced family he is raised by in any case?
"Yes", said the CEO. "The parents realize this may not work, but they've just taken the view of, 'let's give it a go and we should start as early as we can', because the expense of it is not relevant," he stated.
Idealistic and Unrealistic
A number of in the private teaching field who have similar reservations.
Another CEO, chief executive of a tutoring service, who provides personal educators, wrote that "the journey of embracing two identities, or actually, becoming oneself, is something that must be grown into, not manufactured."
The expert wrote that he had relocated from the Far East to the UK at the age of seven, and had been educated experiencing and embodying two backgrounds. He progressed to study at the University of Cambridge.
"The idea that an individual can serve as a representation of Britishness, someone who can possibly transplant the qualities of a English gentleman upon a 12-month-old child, seems to me idealistic and unfeasible," he stated.
"From my perspective, engaging a distinctly UK tutor from babyhood will not automatically achieve the outcome they want.
"I wasn't provided with such a figure, and yet I have been lucky enough to live numerous of the experiences they aspire for their son."
He stated: "The fact is, self-identity cannot be forced from the outside; it must be embraced, and it must be internally driven."
Buying Britishness
Certainly, Britishness is something the expert hopes can be educated – and marketed.
"I think the fact that the world regards us in this regard is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
