"A family based in the northern part of London is looking for an remarkable and experienced tutor to guide their youngest child on his first steps to growing into an English gentleman."
When reading this advertisement, you might easily overlook the phrase "initial stages" as simple an expression.
However, it may be the crucial aspect of this unusual job advert, as it attempts to hire a teacher for a 12-month-old.
Numerous of applications have since been received since the anonymous family advertised their request for the highly paid tutor, who needs to be "someone very special".
Over the last few weeks, the listing has received interest in the press, with many wondering why?
Progressive Approach
The CEO, chief executive of a global tutoring firm, which is helping the family in their search, stated that notwithstanding early doubt, he viewed the idea "forward-looking", and "innovative".
When he consulted the family, he mentioned they understood the atypical nature of their request, and how young their son is.
But, they stated that they "didn't want to wait any longer" to hire a tutor, as they had waited until their elder sibling was five, and by that stage "cultural conditioning had already set in".
What precisely did the family indicate by "cultural predisposition"?
It's "all-encompassing", the expert replied. "The manner you eat, the way you speak".
He stated the elder child had absorbed "very nuanced, body language" from the family, and had taken on their cultural habits. The family told Adam they hoped to prevent history to repeat itself with their younger child.
The intention: To engage a English tutor, who should speak with standard English accent, to influence the baby from day one.
Natural Absorption
"A lot of the learning at the beginning here is kind of acquired indirectly," stated the CEO.
It's through this natural absorption that the family are expecting the child will adopt the English characteristics they aim to instil.
He explained the tutor needed to be someone who went to "the right kinds of schools – similar types of schools as the family plan to send their son to".
"The instructor just has to be the appropriate candidate, they'll be performing things they aren't even aware they're doing, just naturally," he said.
Cost Not Relevant
The family explained to the expert the chosen tutor should ideally also have familiarity of or interest in horse riding, alpine skiing, artistic pursuits and instrumental training so as to shape the child in a wide range of interests.
Additionally though, he stated the family hoped the tutor to sign up the child on a variety of classes so the child would be "equestrian training and picking up an musical instrument by the time they are approximately three years old".
In the family's view, assisting their son become a "British gentleman" will lead to success and create opportunities.
"For all the rights and wrongs of that, because it's undoubtedly a social class indicator," he adds.
But, notwithstanding all this guidance in "UK identity", could the child adopt so-called cultural leaning from the multicultural family he lives with regardless?
"Absolutely", replied the CEO. "They realize this may not work, but they've just taken the perspective of, 'why not attempt it and let's go as quickly as we can', because the expense of it is irrelevant," he said.
Idealistic and Unrealistic
There are some in the tutoring industry who have these concerns.
An education leader, head and founder of an educational organization, who also offer personal educators, wrote that "the process of becoming bicultural, or in fact, becoming oneself, is something that must be experienced personally, not manufactured."
Peter wrote that he had emigrated from the Far East to the United Kingdom at the time of childhood, and had been educated knowing and embodying two backgrounds. He continued to be educated at Cambridge University.
"The notion that an individual can serve as a living vessel of UK identity, an individual who can possibly transfer the characteristics of a English gentleman upon a 12-month-old child, seems to me optimistic and unfeasible," he commented.
"From my perspective, engaging a quintessentially UK tutor from infancy will will not instantly achieve the result they desire.
"I never had such a tutor, and however I have been fortunate enough to live numerous of the opportunities they hope for their son."
He added: "The reality is, self-identity can not be forced from the outside influences; it must be embraced, and it must come from within."
Purchasing UK Culture
Of course, Britishness is something Adam thinks can be educated – and sold.
"In my view the reality that the global community regards us in this regard is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
