"A family based in North London is looking for an extraordinary and qualified tutor to assist their most junior child on his initial journey to becoming an English gentleman."
Looking at this advertisement, you might readily overlook the wording "first-steps" as simple an expression.
But, it may be the most important element of this unique job advert, as it aims to recruit a mentor for a one-year-old.
Numerous of submissions have already been submitted since the unnamed family posted their call for the £180k-a-year tutor, who must be "an exceptional individual".
During the past few weeks, the post has received notice in the press, with numerous questioning why?
Forward-Thinking Method
Adam Caller, chief executive of Tutors International, which is supporting the family in their search, said that in spite of initial doubt, he viewed the plan "far sighted", and "innovative".
When he met the family, he mentioned they recognized the unusual character of their requirement, and how young their son is.
Nevertheless, they explained 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 conditioning had already set in".
But what does the family refer to by "cultural bias"?
It's "all-encompassing", he answered. "The way you eat, the way you speak".
He stated the elder child had absorbed "very nuanced, unspoken signals" from the family, and had adopted their cultural ways. The family told him they did not want history to repeat itself with their new baby.
The strategy: To engage a English tutor, who must speak with standard English accent, to influence the baby from day one.
Natural Absorption
"A great deal of the education at the beginning here is kind of osmotic," said Adam.
It's via this osmosis that the family are aiming the child will acquire the British traits they wish to instil.
He explained the tutor needed to be somebody who went to "the right kinds of schools – the same kinds of schools as the family aspire to send their son to".
"The instructor must be the right kind of person, they'll be doing things they don't even know they're doing, just naturally," he said.
Cost Not Relevant
The family informed him the selected educator should preferably also have familiarity of or interest in horse riding, winter sports, creative fields and music so as to influence the child in a wide range of interests.
Additionally though, he explained the family hoped the tutor to register the child on a range of lessons so the child would be "horseback riding and learning an tool by the time they are around three years old".
In the family's perspective, helping their son grow into a "English gentleman" will lead to accomplishment and create opportunities.
"Taking into account the rights and wrongs of that, because it's certainly a social class indicator," he notes.
But, notwithstanding all this tutelage in "Britishness", might the child adopt what is termed cultural leaning from the multicultural family he resides with in any case?
"Absolutely", answered the CEO. "They know this might not succeed, but they've just taken the attitude of, 'why not attempt it and we'll proceed as soon as we can', because the cost of it is not relevant," he explained.
Overly Optimistic
A number of in the tutoring industry who share these concerns.
Another CEO, head and founder of a tutoring service, who provides personal educators, commented that "the journey of adopting dual cultures, or in fact, becoming oneself, is something that must be grown into, not engineered."
He wrote that he had emigrated from Asia to the Britain at the time of seven, and had been educated experiencing and living dual heritages. He progressed to study at the University of Cambridge.
"The notion that a single person can function as a representation of UK identity, an individual who can somehow transfer the qualities of a British gentleman onto a 12-month-old child, appears optimistic and unrealistic," he wrote.
"Based on my background, employing a distinctly British tutor from early childhood will does not automatically achieve the result they hope for.
"I did not have that kind of mentor, and yet I have been lucky enough to live numerous of the opportunities they hope for their son."
He stated: "The truth is, cultural identity cannot be forced from the outside; it must be embraced, and it must be internally driven."
Acquiring Englishness
Certainly, UK identity is something the CEO hopes can be taught – and commercialized.
"I think the situation that the world views us in this respect is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
