"A family located in north London is looking for an extraordinary and skilled tutor to support their most junior child on his initial journey to growing into an British gentleman."
Looking at this post, you might readily skip the phrase "first-steps" as simple figurative language.
However, it could be the crucial part of this distinctive position posting, as it seeks to hire a teacher for a 12-month-old.
Many of submissions have since been received since the anonymous family posted their call for the highly paid tutor, who has to be "a uniquely qualified person".
Over the last few weeks, the advert has gained notice across the news, with several questioning why?
Progressive Approach
A tutoring expert, head and founder of Tutors International, which is helping the family in their quest, explained that notwithstanding early doubt, he considered the idea "forward-looking", and "innovative".
When he met the family, he mentioned they appreciated the unusual character of their demand, and how young their son is.
However, they explained that they "were unwilling to delay any longer" to engage a tutor, as they had waited until their elder sibling was five, and by that stage "cultural influence had already become established".
But what did the family indicate by "cultural bias"?
It's "comprehensive", he answered. "The way you eat, the way you speak".
He stated the elder child had picked up "extremely delicate, body language" from the family, and had adopted their cultural ways. The family explained to Adam they did not want this pattern to repeat itself with their new baby.
The plan: To hire a UK tutor, who must speak with standard English accent, to shape the baby from day one.
Osmotic Learning
"A lot of the education at the start here is rather acquired indirectly," stated the expert.
It's via this osmosis that the family are expecting the child will adopt the UK customs they aim to cultivate.
He said the tutor must be somebody who went to "the right kinds of schools – the same kinds of schools as the family hope to send their son to".
"The educator just has to be the appropriate candidate, they'll be carrying out things they aren't even aware they're doing, simply by nature," he added.
Money No Object
The family explained to the expert the chosen tutor should preferably also have familiarity of or passion in horse riding, alpine skiing, the arts and musical activities so as to shape the child in a broad spectrum of passions.
Furthermore though, he stated the family desired the tutor to register the child on a selection of courses so the child would be "pony-riding and learning an instrument by the time they are approximately three years old".
In the family's minds, helping their son become a "English gentleman" will lead to achievement and create opportunities.
"For all the pros and cons of that, because it's definitely a social class indicator," he comments.
However, notwithstanding all this guidance in "UK identity", would the child pick up what is termed cultural leaning from the international family he resides with anyway?
"Absolutely", said he. "The parents understand this might not succeed, but they've just taken the view of, 'we should try and we should start as quickly as we can', because the price of it is not relevant," he stated.
Impractical
Several in the private teaching field who share similar doubts.
An education leader, CEO and founder of an educational organization, who provides personal educators, commented that "the journey of embracing two identities, or actually, forming one's identity, is something that must be experienced personally, not manufactured."
The expert noted that he had emigrated from the Far East to the Britain at the period of childhood, and had been educated experiencing and practicing dual heritages. He went on to learn at Cambridge University.
"The concept that an individual can serve as a living vessel of UK identity, someone who can somehow impart the attributes of a UK sophisticate onto a infant child, strikes me as naive and unrealistic," he commented.
"Based on my background, employing a typically British tutor from infancy will not instantly produce the result they hope for.
"I did not have such a figure, and yet I have been fortunate enough to experience numerous of the opportunities they aspire for their son."
He stated: "The reality is, self-identity cannot be imposed from the external environment; it must be embraced, and it must be internally driven."
Purchasing UK Culture
Certainly, English culture is something Adam thinks can be instructed – and commercialized.
"I think the situation that the international society holds us in this regard is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
