"Parents based in the northern part of London wants to find an exceptional and skilled tutor to support their smallest child on his initial journey to becoming an English gentleman."
When reading this post, you might easily miss the phrase "beginning" as just a turn of phrase.
But, it could be the most significant part of this unique job advert, as it aims to find a teacher for a infant.
Many of applications have now been sent in since the unidentified family published their request for the £180,000 per year tutor, who has to be "someone very special".
In recent few weeks, the advert has attracted attention in the media, with many questioning why?
Progressive Approach
A tutoring expert, head and founder of a global tutoring firm, which is helping the family in their quest, explained that in spite of first doubt, he considered the idea "far sighted", and "advanced".
When he consulted the family, he noted they recognized the atypical character of their request, and how early in age their son is.
Nevertheless, they stated that they "preferred not to postpone any longer" to get a tutor, as they had postponed until their elder sibling was five, and by that stage "cultural bias had already taken hold".
What precisely did the family refer to by "cultural predisposition"?
It's "everything", Adam responded. "How you eat, how you speak".
He said the firstborn had picked up "extremely delicate, unspoken signals" from the family, and had adopted their cultural ways. The family informed him they wished to avoid the same situation to repeat itself with their infant.
The plan: To engage a English tutor, who must speak with RP, to influence the baby from day one.
Natural Absorption
"A lot of the learning at the outset here is kind of absorbed naturally," said the expert.
It's through this osmosis that the family are expecting the child will adopt the UK customs they want to instil.
The consultant said the tutor must be somebody who attended "prestigious academies – comparable categories of schools as the family plan to send their son to".
"The tutor just has to be the appropriate candidate, they'll be performing things they aren't even aware they're doing, simply by nature," he said.
Cost Not Relevant
The family informed him the successful candidate should preferably also have familiarity of or interest in horse riding, skiing, creative fields and music so as to influence the child in a wide range of interests.
More than that though, he explained the family desired the tutor to sign up the child on a range of courses so the child would be "pony-riding and picking up an instrument by the time they are around three years old".
In the family's minds, guiding their son grow into a "English gentleman" will result in achievement and open doors.
"Taking into account the pros and cons of that, because it's definitely a social class indicator," he notes.
But, in spite of all this instruction in "English culture", might the child adopt so-called cultural leaning from the multicultural family he lives with in any case?
"Certainly", answered he. "The parents understand this might not succeed, but they've simply adopted the view of, 'let's give it a go and we'll proceed as early as we can', because the expense of it is not a concern," he stated.
Idealistic and Unrealistic
Several in the tutoring industry who share those doubts.
Peter Cui, head and founder of a tutoring service, who supplies private tutors, wrote that "the development of embracing two identities, or in fact, forming one's identity, is something that must be experienced personally, not designed."
He wrote that he had moved from the Far East to the UK at the age of 7 years old, and had been brought up understanding and practicing dual heritages. He progressed to study at the University of Cambridge.
"The notion that an individual can act as a embodiment of UK identity, a person who can somehow transfer the attributes of a English gentleman upon a one-year-old child, seems to me idealistic and unfeasible," he wrote.
"In my experience, employing a quintessentially English tutor from infancy will does not instantly achieve the goal they want.
"I did not have such a tutor, and however I have been fortunate enough to experience many of the experiences they aspire for their son."
He added: "The truth is, self-identity should not be forced from the outside influences; it must be selected, and it must be internally driven."
Acquiring Englishness
Naturally, UK identity is something the expert thinks can be instructed – and marketed.
"In my view the situation that the international society regards us in this respect is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
