"Parents based in North London wants to find an extraordinary and qualified instructor to assist their youngest child on his first steps to growing into an British gentleman."
Looking at this post, you might readily miss the phrase "beginning" as simple a turn of phrase.
However, it may be the crucial part of this unusual position posting, as it seeks to find a mentor for a one-year-old.
Hundreds of submissions have since been submitted since the unidentified family posted their request for the £180k-a-year tutor, who must be "someone very special".
Over the last few weeks, the post has received attention across the press, with many asking why?
Innovative Idea
A tutoring expert, CEO and founder of a global tutoring firm, which is helping the family in their quest, explained that despite early doubt, he considered the concept "forward-looking", and "progressive".
When he met the family, he mentioned they appreciated the unconventional nature of their request, and how young their son is.
But, they clarified that they "were unwilling to delay any longer" to hire a tutor, as they had waited until their older child was five, and by that point "cultural influence had by then set in".
What precisely did the family indicate by "cultural bias"?
It's "everything", Adam replied. "The way you eat, the way you speak".
He stated the older sibling had picked up "very nuanced, non-verbal cues" from the family, and had taken on their cultural ways. The family told the consultant they hoped to prevent history to happen again with their new baby.
The intention: To engage a UK tutor, who needs to speak with RP, to guide the baby from the very start.
Osmotic Learning
"Much of the development at the beginning here is rather osmotic," said the expert.
It's by means of this subtle influence that the family are expecting the child will adopt the UK customs they wish to cultivate.
Adam explained the tutor needed to be someone who attended "prestigious academies – the same kinds of schools as the family plan to send their son to".
"The tutor 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 said.
Money No Object
The family explained to the expert the selected educator should ideally also have knowledge of or interest in horse riding, winter sports, creative fields and musical activities so as to influence the child in a diverse set of hobbies.
More than that though, he stated the family hoped the tutor to sign up the child on a selection of lessons so the child would be "equestrian training and picking up an tool by the time they are about three years old".
In the family's minds, guiding their son become a "UK sophisticate" 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, in spite of all this tutelage in "UK identity", would the child adopt alleged cultural leaning from the globally influenced family he lives with anyway?
"Absolutely", answered he. "The family realize this may not work, but they've just taken the view of, 'why not attempt it and let's go as soon as we can', because the price of it is not a concern," he stated.
Idealistic and Unrealistic
Several in the private teaching field who have those concerns.
Peter Cui, head and founder of a tutoring service, who supplies personal educators, commented that "the development of adopting dual cultures, or actually, forming one's identity, is something that must be experienced personally, not manufactured."
He noted that he had relocated from Asia to the Britain at the time of 7 years old, and had been brought up knowing and embodying two backgrounds. He continued to learn at Cambridge University.
"The notion that one individual can serve as a embodiment of English culture, someone who can in some way transfer the characteristics of a UK sophisticate onto a one-year-old child, strikes me as optimistic and unfeasible," he wrote.
"In my experience, engaging a quintessentially English tutor from infancy will does not necessarily achieve the goal they want.
"I did not have that kind of mentor, and nevertheless I have been fortunate enough to enjoy many of the experiences they hope for their son."
He added: "The reality is, cultural identity can not be forced from the outside; it must be chosen, and it must originate internally."
Purchasing UK Culture
Of course, Britishness is something Adam thinks can be taught – and sold.
"In my view the situation that the world holds us in this regard is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
