"A household located in North London seeks an exceptional and skilled educator to support their youngest child on his initial journey to growing into an British gentleman."
Looking at this advertisement, you might easily overlook the term "first-steps" as just a turn of phrase.
Yet, it may be the most significant aspect of this unique employment listing, as it attempts to find a teacher for a infant.
Hundreds of applications have since been sent in since the unnamed family posted their search for the highly paid tutor, who has to be "an exceptional individual".
During the past few weeks, the advert has attracted interest throughout the media, with many questioning why?
Progressive Approach
A tutoring expert, CEO and founder of Tutors International, which is helping the family in their hunt, explained that despite early scepticism, he found the plan "visionary", and "progressive".
When he spoke with the family, he said they understood the unusual character of their request, and how immature their son is.
Nevertheless, they explained that they "were unwilling to delay any longer" to hire a tutor, as they had held off until their older child was five, and by that age "cultural bias had by then become established".
What precisely does the family indicate by "cultural leaning"?
It's "comprehensive", Adam answered. "The manner you eat, the way you speak".
He stated the older sibling had absorbed "extremely delicate, unspoken signals" from the family, and had adopted their cultural habits. The family told Adam they wished to avoid this pattern to happen again with their new baby.
The strategy: To hire a English tutor, who needs to speak with Received Pronunciation, to shape the baby from day one.
Osmotic Learning
"A great deal of the development at the beginning here is kind of osmotic," said the expert.
It's through this natural absorption that the family are hoping the child will adopt the British traits they want to cultivate.
He explained the tutor needed to be someone who attended "prestigious academies – comparable categories of schools as the family hope to send their son to".
"The instructor must be the suitable individual, they'll be performing things they may not realize they're doing, simply by nature," he commented.
Expense Not a Factor
The family told him the chosen tutor should ideally also have knowledge of or interest in equestrian activities, winter sports, creative fields and instrumental training so as to influence the child in a wide range of interests.
Furthermore though, he stated the family wanted the tutor to sign up the child on a range of courses so the child would be "equestrian training and starting an tool by the time they are around three years old".
In the family's view, guiding their son grow into a "British gentleman" will lead to achievement and provide access.
"For all the pros and cons of that, because it's certainly a social class indicator," he adds.
However, notwithstanding all this tutelage in "Britishness", would the child pick up what is termed cultural bias from the globally influenced family he resides with anyway?
"Absolutely", replied he. "They know this may not work, but they've just taken the perspective of, 'we should try and we should start as quickly as we can', because the expense of it is not a concern," he explained.
Idealistic and Unrealistic
A number of in the education sector who express those reservations.
Peter Cui, head and founder of an educational organization, who supplies private tutors, wrote that "the development of adopting dual cultures, or in fact, discovering oneself, is something that must be grown into, not manufactured."
Peter wrote that he had moved from China to the UK at the time of childhood, and had been educated knowing and living both cultures. He continued to be educated at Cambridge University.
"The idea that an individual can function as a embodiment of English culture, a person who can somehow impart the qualities of a English gentleman onto a one-year-old child, strikes me as naive and unrealistic," he stated.
"Based on my background, employing a distinctly UK tutor from babyhood will does not instantly achieve the outcome they hope for.
"I never had such a figure, and however I have been privileged enough to enjoy several of the situations they aspire for their son."
He added: "The fact is, self-identity should not be imposed from the outside influences; it must be embraced, and it must come from within."
Purchasing UK Culture
Of course, UK identity is something the expert thinks can be taught – and commercialized.
"In my view the situation that the global community regards us in this light is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
