"A household located in North London wants to find an extraordinary and skilled instructor to guide their youngest child on his early path to turning into an English gentleman."
When reading this listing, you might easily overlook the wording "beginning" as just a turn of phrase.
But, it could be the crucial part of this distinctive employment listing, as it seeks to recruit a mentor for a infant.
Many of responses have now been submitted since the unidentified family advertised their search for the £180,000 per year tutor, who must be "an exceptional individual".
In recent few weeks, the advert has gained notice across the news, with numerous questioning why?
Innovative Idea
Adam Caller, CEO and founder of an education consultancy, which is helping the family in their search, stated that in spite of early doubt, he considered the plan "forward-looking", and "progressive".
When he spoke with the family, he said they understood the unconventional character of their request, and how early in age their son is.
Nevertheless, they explained that they "were unwilling to delay any longer" to engage a tutor, as they had held off until their elder sibling was five, and by that age "cultural bias had by then set in".
What exactly did the family refer to by "cultural bias"?
It's "everything", Adam responded. "The way you eat, the way you speak".
He said the firstborn had picked up "very nuanced, unspoken signals" from the family, and had assumed their cultural ways. The family explained to the consultant they did not want history to recur with their infant.
The strategy: To engage a UK tutor, who should speak with RP, to shape the baby right from the beginning.
Osmotic Learning
"A great deal of the education at the start here is rather absorbed naturally," said the CEO.
It's through this natural absorption that the family are expecting the child will acquire the UK customs they wish to impart.
He noted the tutor needed to be someone who attended "the right kinds of schools – similar types of schools as the family hope to send their son to".
"The educator simply needs to be the right kind of person, they'll be doing things they aren't even aware they're doing, simply by nature," he added.
Expense Not a Factor
The family explained to Adam the chosen tutor should ideally also have understanding of or interest in horse riding, winter sports, artistic pursuits and instrumental training so as to influence the child in a diverse set of interests.
Additionally though, he explained the family wanted the tutor to sign up the child on a selection of classes 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 view, helping their son develop into a "UK sophisticate" will result in success and open doors.
"Taking into account the advantages and disadvantages of that, because it's definitely a class statement," he notes.
But, notwithstanding all this tutelage in "English culture", might the child adopt alleged cultural bias from the international family he is raised by in any case?
"Yes", said Adam. "The parents realize this may not work, but they've simply adopted the attitude of, 'why not attempt it and let's go as early as we can', because the cost of it is irrelevant," he said.
Impractical
There are some in the education sector who share these reservations.
An education leader, chief executive of Blue Education, who provides individual instructors, commented that "the development of becoming bicultural, or indeed, discovering oneself, is something that must be lived into, not designed."
The expert noted that he had emigrated from Asia to the United Kingdom at the time of childhood, and had been educated experiencing and embodying both cultures. He progressed to study at a prestigious UK institution.
"The idea that a single person can function as a living vessel of Britishness, a person who can possibly transplant the qualities of a UK sophisticate upon a 12-month-old child, strikes me as naive and unrealistic," he stated.
"In my experience, having a typically British tutor from infancy will does not automatically create the goal they hope for.
"I never had such a figure, and nevertheless I have been fortunate enough to live many of the opportunities they hope for their son."
He continued: "The truth is, personal identity cannot be dictated from the outside influences; it must be embraced, and it must be internally driven."
Buying Britishness
Of course, Britishness is something Adam believes can be instructed – and commercialized.
"I think the reality that the international society holds us in this respect is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
