"Parents residing in north London seeks an remarkable and experienced tutor to support their most junior child on his first steps to becoming an English gentleman."
Looking at this post, you might naturally skip the term "initial stages" as just figurative language.
Yet, it could be the crucial part of this unique position posting, as it attempts to find a mentor for a 12-month-old.
Hundreds of responses have now been sent in since the anonymous family published their call for the £180,000 per year tutor, who must be "a uniquely qualified person".
Over the last few weeks, the listing has received attention in the news, with numerous wondering why?
Innovative Idea
Adam Caller, chief executive of an education consultancy, which is supporting the family in their search, stated that despite initial skepticism, he found the plan "far sighted", and "innovative".
When he spoke with the family, he noted they understood the unusual character of their request, and how immature their son is.
However, they explained that they "didn't want to wait any longer" to hire a tutor, as they had postponed until their elder sibling was five, and by that point "cultural conditioning had already taken hold".
What exactly does the family refer to by "cultural predisposition"?
It's "all-encompassing", he answered. "The way you eat, the manner you speak".
He stated the elder child had adopted "really subtle, non-verbal cues" from the family, and had adopted their cultural norms. The family told him they wished to avoid this pattern to happen again with their younger child.
The intention: To engage a English tutor, who needs to speak with standard English accent, to guide the baby from day one.
Natural Absorption
"Much of the learning at the beginning here is somewhat absorbed naturally," explained the expert.
It's through this natural absorption that the family are expecting the child will acquire the UK customs they aim to cultivate.
He said the tutor needed to be someone who attended "prestigious academies – comparable categories of schools as the family plan to send their son to".
"The instructor just has to be the right kind of person, they'll be doing things they may not realize they're doing, effortlessly," he added.
Money No Object
The family told the expert the selected educator should ideally also have knowledge of or interest in riding, winter sports, creative fields and musical activities so as to shape the child in a diverse set of interests.
More than that though, he explained the family hoped the tutor to enrol the child on a range of lessons 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, assisting their son develop into a "English gentleman" will result in achievement and open doors.
"Considering the rights and wrongs of that, because it's certainly a class statement," he notes.
However, in spite of all this tutelage in "UK identity", could the child adopt what is termed cultural bias from the multicultural family he lives with regardless?
"Yes", replied Adam. "The family realize this could fail, but they've simply adopted the perspective of, 'why not attempt it and we should start as quickly as we can', because the cost of it is irrelevant," he stated.
Impractical
There are some in the private teaching field who express those concerns.
An education leader, CEO and founder of Blue Education, who provides personal educators, commented that "the journey of becoming bicultural, or in fact, forming one's identity, is something that must be lived into, not engineered."
Peter noted that he had moved from China to the Britain at the age of childhood, and had been raised experiencing and practicing two backgrounds. He continued to be educated at Cambridge University.
"The notion that an individual can function as a living vessel of UK identity, a person who can possibly impart the characteristics of a British gentleman to a one-year-old child, appears naive and impractical," he wrote.
"In my experience, employing a quintessentially UK tutor from infancy will not instantly create the outcome they desire.
"I never had that kind of mentor, and nevertheless I have been fortunate enough to live numerous of the opportunities they desire for their son."
He added: "The reality is, self-identity should not be forced from the outside; it must be chosen, and it must originate internally."
Purchasing UK Culture
Naturally, English culture is something the CEO thinks can be educated – and commercialized.
"I believe the situation that the international society holds us in this light is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
