"A household residing in north London is looking for an remarkable and skilled tutor to support their smallest child on his first steps to becoming an English gentleman."
When reading this listing, you might easily skip the phrase "initial stages" as mere a turn of phrase.
However, it could be the crucial aspect of this distinctive position posting, as it seeks to recruit a mentor for a 12-month-old.
Many of responses have now been received since the anonymous family posted their call for the £180,000 per year tutor, who needs to be "a uniquely qualified person".
During the past few weeks, the listing has attracted notice in the media, with several questioning why?
Progressive Approach
Adam Caller, chief executive of Tutors International, which is assisting the family in their search, said that in spite of first skepticism, he viewed the idea "visionary", and "progressive".
When he spoke with the family, he mentioned they appreciated the unusual nature of their request, and how immature their son is.
However, they clarified 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 stage "cultural bias had already set in".
What exactly did the family refer to by "cultural predisposition"?
It's "comprehensive", he responded. "The way you eat, the way you speak".
He stated the older sibling had adopted "very nuanced, unspoken signals" from the family, and had taken on their cultural ways. The family told Adam they hoped to prevent the same situation to happen again with their infant.
The strategy: To bring in a British tutor, who should speak with standard English accent, to guide the baby right from the beginning.
Natural Absorption
"A lot of the learning at the start here is rather absorbed naturally," said Adam.
It's through this natural absorption that the family are expecting the child will adopt the British traits they want to instil.
He said the tutor must be someone who went to "the appropriate educational institutions – the same kinds of schools as the family hope to send their son to".
"The educator just has to be the suitable individual, they'll be carrying out things they don't even know they're doing, effortlessly," he added.
Cost Not Relevant
The family informed Adam the successful candidate should preferably also have understanding of or interest in horse riding, winter sports, artistic pursuits and musical activities so as to shape the child in a wide range of hobbies.
Furthermore though, he said the family hoped the tutor to register the child on a selection of lessons so the child would be "pony-riding and learning an musical instrument by the time they are approximately three years old".
In the family's view, assisting their son develop into a "UK sophisticate" will bring about accomplishment and open doors.
"Considering the pros and cons of that, because it's definitely a class statement," he comments.
However, despite all this tutelage in "English culture", could the child absorb alleged cultural leaning from the multicultural family he resides with in any case?
"Certainly", said the CEO. "The family know this might not succeed, but they've simply adopted the perspective of, 'why not attempt it and we should start as quickly as we can', because the price of it is not a concern," he stated.
Idealistic and Unrealistic
Several in the tutoring industry who express these doubts.
Another CEO, CEO and founder of a tutoring service, who also offer private tutors, wrote that "the development of becoming bicultural, or in fact, discovering oneself, is something that must be lived into, not manufactured."
The expert noted that he had relocated from the Far East to the Britain at the time of childhood, and had been raised understanding and living two backgrounds. He went on to study at a prestigious UK institution.
"The notion that an individual can act as a living vessel of English culture, someone who can in some way transplant the attributes of a UK sophisticate to a one-year-old child, appears optimistic and unfeasible," he stated.
"In my experience, engaging a quintessentially UK tutor from infancy will not necessarily produce the outcome they hope for.
"I wasn't provided with such a tutor, and however I have been fortunate enough to enjoy several of the experiences they desire for their son."
He added: "The reality is, personal identity should not be imposed from the outside; it must be embraced, and it must come from within."
Buying Britishness
Certainly, Britishness is something the expert hopes can be educated – and marketed.
"I think the situation that the global community holds us in this respect is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
