"A family residing in North London seeks an exceptional and experienced instructor to support their youngest child on his early path to turning into an English gentleman."
When reading this post, you might easily skip the wording "initial stages" as simple an expression.
But, it may be the crucial aspect of this unique employment listing, as it aims to hire a mentor for a one-year-old.
Many of applications have now been received since the unidentified family posted their request for the £180,000 per year tutor, who has to be "a uniquely qualified person".
Over the last few weeks, the post has attracted attention in the press, with numerous wondering why?
Progressive Approach
A tutoring expert, head and founder of Tutors International, which is helping the family in their quest, said that notwithstanding first scepticism, he found the idea "visionary", and "advanced".
When he met the family, he noted they appreciated the atypical character of their request, and how early in age their son is.
However, they clarified that they "didn't want to wait any longer" to engage a tutor, as they had held off until their elder sibling was five, and by that point "cultural bias had already become established".
But what does the family refer to by "cultural predisposition"?
It's "comprehensive", the expert answered. "The way you eat, the manner you speak".
He stated the elder child had adopted "very nuanced, non-verbal cues" from the family, and had adopted their cultural ways. The family explained to the consultant they wished to avoid the same situation to happen again with their younger child.
The strategy: To hire a English tutor, who should speak with RP, to shape the baby from the very start.
Natural Absorption
"Much of the development at the start here is somewhat acquired indirectly," said Adam.
It's through this osmosis that the family are aiming the child will acquire the British traits they want to impart.
The consultant explained the tutor needed to be an individual who studied at "the appropriate educational institutions – similar types of schools as the family hope to send their son to".
"The educator must be the suitable individual, they'll be doing things they may not realize they're doing, effortlessly," he said.
Expense Not a Factor
The family informed the expert the selected educator should ideally also have knowledge of or passion in riding, skiing, the arts and musical activities so as to influence the child in a broad spectrum of interests.
More than that though, he said the family desired the tutor to enrol the child on a selection of courses so the child would be "pony-riding and picking up an instrument by the time they are approximately three years old".
In the family's perspective, assisting their son grow into a "English gentleman" will result in achievement and create opportunities.
"Considering the advantages and disadvantages of that, because it's undoubtedly a status symbol," he notes.
However, in spite of all this guidance in "Britishness", could the child adopt so-called cultural bias from the international family he lives with anyway?
"Yes", answered the CEO. "They realize this could fail, but they've merely embraced the view of, 'let's give it a go and we should start as soon as we can', because the price of it is irrelevant," he said.
Impractical
There are some in the education sector who share similar doubts.
An education leader, chief executive of a tutoring service, who provides individual instructors, commented that "the journey of becoming bicultural, or indeed, discovering oneself, is something that must be grown into, not manufactured."
The expert wrote that he had moved from the Far East to the UK at the time of 7 years old, and had been raised experiencing and practicing both cultures. He continued to study at a prestigious UK institution.
"The notion that an individual can serve as a embodiment of Britishness, someone who can possibly impart the attributes of a British gentleman to a one-year-old child, strikes me as idealistic and impractical," he wrote.
"In my experience, engaging a quintessentially UK tutor from early childhood will does not automatically achieve the result they want.
"I wasn't provided with that kind of mentor, and yet I have been privileged enough to experience many of the opportunities they desire for their son."
He stated: "The truth is, cultural identity cannot be imposed from the outside; it must be chosen, and it must come from within."
Acquiring Englishness
Naturally, English culture is something the CEO believes can be taught – and commercialized.
"I think the situation that the international society regards us in this regard is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
