"A household located in north London seeks an remarkable and experienced tutor to guide their most junior child on his initial journey to turning into an British gentleman."
Looking at this listing, you might naturally miss the phrase "initial stages" as just a turn of phrase.
But, it might be the most important aspect of this unique job advert, as it seeks to recruit a tutor for a one-year-old.
Numerous of submissions have since been sent in since the anonymous family advertised their call for the £180,000 per year tutor, who must be "someone very special".
During the past few weeks, the listing has gained notice in the media, with several wondering why?
Forward-Thinking Method
A tutoring expert, head and founder of Tutors International, which is assisting the family in their hunt, said that notwithstanding early skepticism, he considered the plan "forward-looking", and "innovative".
When he met the family, he said they recognized the atypical nature of their request, and how early in age their son is.
Nevertheless, they stated that they "preferred not to postpone any longer" to hire a tutor, as they had postponed until their elder sibling was five, and by that point "cultural influence had already set in".
What precisely does the family mean by "cultural predisposition"?
It's "everything", he replied. "How you eat, how you speak".
He stated the firstborn had adopted "extremely delicate, unspoken signals" from the family, and had assumed their cultural ways. The family told the consultant they hoped to prevent history to recur with their younger child.
The plan: To engage a English tutor, who should speak with Received Pronunciation, to shape the baby right from the beginning.
Osmotic Learning
"A lot of the learning at the outset here is somewhat osmotic," said the expert.
It's through this natural absorption that the family are aiming the child will pick up the UK customs they want to instil.
The consultant noted the tutor had to be an individual who went to "prestigious academies – the same kinds of schools as the family aspire to send their son to".
"The instructor just has to be the right kind of person, they'll be carrying out things they may not realize they're doing, simply by nature," he added.
Money No Object
The family told Adam the selected educator should ideally also have familiarity of or enthusiasm in riding, alpine skiing, the arts and music so as to inspire the child in a broad spectrum of interests.
More than that though, he said the family hoped the tutor to register the child on a variety of lessons so the child would be "pony-riding and starting an tool by the time they are around three years old".
In the family's view, guiding their son grow into a "English gentleman" will bring about accomplishment and create opportunities.
"Considering the rights and wrongs of that, because it's certainly a class statement," he adds.
However, notwithstanding all this guidance in "English culture", could the child absorb alleged cultural bias from the globally influenced family he is raised by in any case?
"Certainly", said the CEO. "The parents realize this might not succeed, but they've simply adopted the attitude of, 'let's give it a go and we should start as quickly as we can', because the price of it is irrelevant," he stated.
Impractical
Several in the tutoring industry who have those doubts.
Another CEO, CEO and founder of a tutoring service, who also offer private tutors, commented that "the journey of embracing two identities, or in fact, becoming oneself, is something that must be experienced personally, not manufactured."
He wrote that he had relocated from Asia to the United Kingdom at the time of childhood, and had been raised understanding and embodying two backgrounds. He went on to learn at Cambridge University.
"The notion that a single person can act as a embodiment of UK identity, someone who can possibly impart the characteristics of a English gentleman onto a 12-month-old child, strikes me as naive and impractical," he commented.
"In my experience, employing a quintessentially UK tutor from babyhood will will not automatically produce the outcome they hope for.
"I never had such a figure, and yet I have been lucky enough to live numerous of the opportunities they aspire for their son."
He continued: "The fact is, cultural identity cannot be forced from the outside; it must be embraced, and it must be internally driven."
Acquiring Englishness
Certainly, Britishness is something the CEO thinks can be instructed – and commercialized.
"I think the fact that the global community regards us in this regard is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
