"A family based in north London is looking for an exceptional and skilled educator to assist their smallest child on his initial journey to becoming an English gentleman."
Upon seeing this advertisement, you might naturally overlook the phrase "first-steps" as just a turn of phrase.
However, it may be the crucial aspect of this unusual position posting, as it attempts to find a mentor for a 12-month-old.
Many of applications have now been sent in since the unidentified family advertised their request for the £180,000 per year tutor, who has to be "someone very special".
During the past few weeks, the advert has attracted interest in the news, with several asking why?
Innovative Idea
Adam Caller, chief executive of Tutors International, which is supporting the family in their quest, said that despite initial doubt, he viewed the concept "visionary", and "progressive".
When he met the family, he said they appreciated the atypical nature of their requirement, and how immature their son is.
But, they clarified that they "didn't want to wait any longer" to hire a tutor, as they had waited until their older child was five, and by that age "cultural bias had already taken hold".
But what did the family mean by "cultural predisposition"?
It's "comprehensive", Adam responded. "The manner you eat, the way you speak".
He said the older sibling had absorbed "extremely delicate, non-verbal cues" from the family, and had taken on their cultural norms. The family explained to the consultant they wished to avoid this pattern to happen again with their new baby.
The strategy: To hire a English tutor, who must speak with RP, to influence the baby from the very start.
Subtle Influence
"Much of the learning at the start here is somewhat absorbed naturally," said Adam.
It's by means of this osmosis that the family are expecting the child will adopt the UK customs they aim to cultivate.
Adam explained 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 instructor simply needs to be the appropriate candidate, they'll be carrying out things they may not realize they're doing, simply by nature," he commented.
Money No Object
The family informed him the chosen tutor should preferably also have knowledge of or interest in equestrian activities, alpine skiing, artistic pursuits and musical activities so as to shape the child in a diverse set of hobbies.
Furthermore though, he explained the family hoped the tutor to enrol the child on a selection of courses 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 minds, assisting their son develop into a "British gentleman" will bring about achievement and provide access.
"Taking into account the pros and cons of that, because it's definitely a status symbol," he comments.
However, notwithstanding all this guidance in "Britishness", would the child adopt alleged cultural leaning from the multicultural family he resides with regardless?
"Absolutely", replied the CEO. "They know this may not work, but they've merely embraced the attitude of, 'why not attempt it and we'll proceed as quickly as we can', because the expense of it is irrelevant," he said.
Idealistic and Unrealistic
Several in the education sector who express these doubts.
An education leader, head and founder of an educational organization, who supplies personal educators, wrote that "the development of adopting dual cultures, or actually, becoming oneself, is something that must be grown into, not designed."
He wrote that he had emigrated from the Far East to the Britain at the period of childhood, and had been raised understanding and practicing two backgrounds. He progressed to study at the University of Cambridge.
"The idea that a single person can act as a representation of UK identity, a person who can possibly impart the qualities of a UK sophisticate to a infant child, strikes me as idealistic and unrealistic," he wrote.
"In my experience, having a quintessentially English tutor from early childhood will does not necessarily produce the outcome they want.
"I never had such a figure, and yet I have been fortunate enough to live several of the situations they hope for their son."
He continued: "The fact is, personal identity can not be forced from the external environment; it must be chosen, and it must come from within."
Acquiring Englishness
Naturally, Britishness is something Adam thinks can be instructed – and commercialized.
"I think the fact that the international society regards us in this light is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
