"A household located in the northern part of London wants to find an exceptional and experienced educator to support their most junior child on his early path to becoming an British gentleman."
When reading this advertisement, you might readily overlook the term "initial stages" as just an expression.
But, it may be the crucial element of this unique job advert, as it seeks to recruit a tutor for a one-year-old.
Hundreds of submissions have since been received since the unnamed family published their request for the highly paid tutor, who needs to be "someone very special".
During the past few weeks, the post has gained notice throughout the press, with numerous asking why?
Progressive Approach
Adam Caller, CEO and founder of a global tutoring firm, which is helping the family in their quest, explained that despite first scepticism, he considered the plan "far sighted", and "innovative".
When he spoke with the family, he noted they appreciated the atypical nature of their requirement, and how immature their son is.
However, they clarified that they "didn't want to wait any longer" to hire a tutor, as they had waited until their older child was five, and by that point "cultural conditioning had already become established".
What precisely did the family refer to by "cultural bias"?
It's "everything", he replied. "The manner you eat, the manner you speak".
He said the firstborn had absorbed "very nuanced, non-verbal cues" from the family, and had assumed their cultural ways. The family informed the consultant they hoped to prevent history to happen again with their infant.
The strategy: To bring in a British tutor, who should speak with RP, to shape the baby from day one.
Subtle Influence
"A great deal of the learning at the start here is rather osmotic," stated the expert.
It's through this osmosis that the family are aiming the child will acquire the UK customs they aim to instil.
He noted the tutor needed to be someone who studied at "the appropriate educational institutions – the same kinds of schools as the family plan to send their son to".
"The educator must be the appropriate candidate, they'll be doing things they aren't even aware they're doing, effortlessly," he said.
Money No Object
The family explained to him the selected educator should ideally also have familiarity of or interest in horse riding, winter sports, creative fields and music so as to shape the child in a broad spectrum of hobbies.
Furthermore though, he stated the family desired the tutor to enrol the child on a selection of lessons so the child would be "horseback riding and learning an musical instrument by the time they are around three years old".
In the family's minds, helping their son develop into a "UK sophisticate" will result in success and provide access.
"For all the advantages and disadvantages of that, because it's certainly a status symbol," he notes.
However, in spite of all this guidance in "Britishness", would the child adopt what is termed cultural bias from the multicultural family he is raised by in any case?
"Absolutely", answered the CEO. "They understand this might not succeed, but they've just taken the perspective of, 'why not attempt it and we'll proceed as soon as we can', because the expense of it is irrelevant," he stated.
Impractical
Several in the tutoring industry who share similar concerns.
Another CEO, chief executive of Blue Education, who also offer private tutors, wrote that "the process of embracing two identities, or in fact, discovering oneself, is something that must be experienced personally, not engineered."
Peter wrote that he had relocated from Asia to the United Kingdom at the period of 7 years old, and had been brought up understanding and embodying two backgrounds. He progressed to study at Cambridge University.
"The notion that one individual can act as a representation of English culture, an individual who can somehow transplant the characteristics of a British gentleman onto a one-year-old child, strikes me as optimistic and unfeasible," he stated.
"From my perspective, engaging a distinctly British tutor from babyhood will not automatically achieve the result they want.
"I never had such a figure, and nevertheless I have been lucky enough to live several of the situations they hope for their son."
He added: "The fact is, self-identity should not be dictated from the external environment; it must be chosen, and it must originate internally."
Purchasing UK Culture
Certainly, Britishness is something the expert believes can be instructed – and commercialized.
"I think the situation that the international society holds us in this light is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
