"A family based in north London wants to find an remarkable and experienced educator to support their most junior child on his first steps to turning into an English gentleman."
Upon seeing this post, you might easily skip the term "initial stages" as simple figurative language.
However, it could be the crucial part of this distinctive employment listing, as it attempts to hire a teacher for a infant.
Hundreds of submissions have already been sent in since the unidentified family posted their call for the £180k-a-year tutor, who must be "a uniquely qualified person".
In recent few weeks, the advert has gained attention throughout the press, with numerous asking why?
Innovative Idea
The CEO, CEO and founder of a global tutoring firm, which is helping the family in their quest, stated that despite initial scepticism, he found the plan "far sighted", and "advanced".
When he met the family, he said they appreciated the atypical character of their demand, and how immature their son is.
However, they stated that they "didn't want to wait any longer" to engage a tutor, as they had waited until their older child was five, and by that point "cultural bias had already set in".
What exactly does the family refer to by "cultural bias"?
It's "everything", he answered. "The manner you eat, how you speak".
He stated the firstborn had absorbed "very nuanced, non-verbal cues" from the family, and had adopted their cultural norms. The family told Adam they did not want history to repeat itself with their younger child.
The strategy: To hire a UK tutor, who needs to speak with RP, to shape the baby from day one.
Natural Absorption
"A great deal of the education at the beginning here is rather osmotic," said Adam.
It's by means of this osmosis that the family are aiming the child will pick up the British traits they aim to instil.
He explained the tutor must be somebody who attended "the appropriate educational institutions – comparable categories 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, just naturally," he said.
Cost Not Relevant
The family explained to Adam the chosen tutor should ideally also have familiarity of or passion in riding, skiing, the arts and instrumental training so as to inspire the child in a diverse set of passions.
More than that though, he explained the family hoped the tutor to register the child on a range of courses so the child would be "equestrian training and picking up an tool by the time they are about three years old".
In the family's minds, assisting their son develop into a "British gentleman" will bring about accomplishment and provide access.
"Taking into account the advantages and disadvantages of that, because it's undoubtedly a status symbol," he notes.
Yet, despite all this tutelage in "Britishness", could the child pick up alleged cultural leaning from the globally influenced family he is raised by anyway?
"Certainly", replied the CEO. "The family know this might not succeed, but they've just taken the perspective of, 'we should try and let's go as early as we can', because the expense of it is not a concern," he explained.
Overly Optimistic
There are some in the education sector who share those doubts.
Another CEO, chief executive of Blue Education, who provides personal educators, wrote that "the development of embracing two identities, or in fact, forming one's identity, is something that must be grown into, not engineered."
The expert wrote that he had relocated from China to the UK at the period of childhood, and had been educated knowing and living both cultures. He continued to learn at a prestigious UK institution.
"The idea that a single person can serve as a embodiment of Britishness, a person who can possibly transfer the qualities of a British gentleman to a 12-month-old child, seems to me optimistic and impractical," he stated.
"In my experience, having a quintessentially UK tutor from babyhood will will not necessarily achieve the goal they hope for.
"I did not have such a figure, and nevertheless I have been privileged enough to enjoy many of the opportunities they desire for their son."
He continued: "The reality is, cultural identity cannot be dictated from the external environment; it must be selected, and it must be internally driven."
Buying Britishness
Of course, UK identity is something the expert hopes can be taught – and commercialized.
"In my view the reality that the global community regards us in this respect is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
