"A family residing in North London seeks an extraordinary and skilled instructor to guide their smallest child on his initial journey to growing into an British gentleman."
When reading this advertisement, you might readily miss the phrase "first-steps" as mere a turn of phrase.
Yet, it could be the crucial aspect of this distinctive employment listing, as it seeks to hire a teacher for a infant.
Many of applications have now been submitted since the unnamed family posted their request for the £180k-a-year tutor, who has to be "an exceptional individual".
In recent few weeks, the listing has attracted interest throughout the news, with several wondering why?
Forward-Thinking Method
A tutoring expert, head and founder of an education consultancy, which is assisting the family in their hunt, explained that in spite of initial skepticism, he viewed the idea "visionary", and "advanced".
When he spoke with the family, he mentioned they recognized the unconventional nature of their demand, and how young their son is.
Nevertheless, they stated that they "didn't want to wait any longer" to hire a tutor, as they had postponed until their older child was five, and by that stage "cultural influence had already become established".
What exactly does the family refer to by "cultural leaning"?
It's "everything", the expert responded. "How you eat, the way you speak".
He explained the elder child had picked up "extremely delicate, unspoken signals" from the family, and had taken on their cultural norms. The family informed Adam they wished to avoid the same situation to recur with their new baby.
The strategy: To bring in a UK tutor, who needs to speak with standard English accent, to shape the baby right from the beginning.
Osmotic Learning
"A great deal of the education at the beginning here is kind of absorbed naturally," stated Adam.
It's via this subtle influence that the family are expecting the child will acquire the British traits they want to cultivate.
He explained the tutor must be an individual who went to "the appropriate educational institutions – similar types of schools as the family plan to send their son to".
"The educator must be the right kind of person, they'll be carrying out things they may not realize they're doing, simply by nature," he said.
Cost Not Relevant
The family told him the chosen tutor should preferably also have familiarity of or enthusiasm in horse riding, winter sports, the arts and music so as to inspire the child in a wide range of interests.
Furthermore though, he said the family hoped the tutor to register the child on a range of courses so the child would be "equestrian training and learning an tool by the time they are approximately three years old".
In the family's minds, helping their son grow into a "UK sophisticate" will bring about accomplishment and create opportunities.
"For all the pros and cons of that, because it's certainly a status symbol," he comments.
However, notwithstanding all this instruction in "UK identity", would the child adopt so-called cultural leaning from the international family he is raised by in any case?
"Absolutely", answered the CEO. "The parents understand this could fail, but they've merely embraced the perspective of, 'we should try and we should start as soon as we can', because the cost of it is not a concern," he stated.
Impractical
There are some in the tutoring industry who express similar reservations.
Peter Cui, CEO and founder of an educational organization, who also offer personal educators, wrote that "the journey of becoming bicultural, or indeed, becoming oneself, is something that must be lived into, not engineered."
Peter explained that he had relocated from Asia to the UK at the period of childhood, and had been raised understanding and living dual heritages. He went on to be educated at Cambridge University.
"The notion that an individual can function as a embodiment of English culture, someone who can somehow transfer the characteristics of a English gentleman upon a one-year-old child, seems to me naive and unfeasible," he wrote.
"From my perspective, employing a typically English tutor from infancy will does not automatically create the outcome they hope for.
"I did not have that kind of mentor, and nevertheless I have been lucky enough to experience several of the opportunities they aspire for their son."
He added: "The truth is, cultural identity can not be dictated from the outside; it must be selected, and it must be internally driven."
Buying Britishness
Of course, UK identity is something the expert thinks can be taught – and marketed.
"In my view the fact that the global community regards us in this light is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
