"Parents residing in North London is looking for an remarkable and skilled educator to assist their most junior child on his early path to becoming an British gentleman."
Looking at this listing, you might naturally miss the term "first-steps" as simple figurative language.
However, it could be the crucial aspect of this unusual employment listing, as it aims to hire a teacher for a infant.
Numerous of submissions have since been received since the unidentified family advertised their call for the highly paid tutor, who needs to be "someone very special".
During the past few weeks, the post has attracted interest throughout the news, with numerous wondering why?
Innovative Idea
The CEO, CEO and founder of an education consultancy, which is supporting the family in their hunt, explained that in spite of early scepticism, he found the idea "visionary", and "progressive".
When he spoke with the family, he mentioned they appreciated the atypical character of their request, and how early in age their son is.
Nevertheless, they stated that they "preferred not to postpone any longer" to get a tutor, as they had waited until their older child was five, and by that age "cultural influence had already set in".
What precisely did the family refer to by "cultural bias"?
It's "everything", Adam replied. "How you eat, the way you speak".
He stated the elder child had adopted "very nuanced, body language" from the family, and had taken on their cultural ways. The family told the consultant they wished to avoid this pattern to recur with their new baby.
The strategy: To bring in a English tutor, who needs to speak with Received Pronunciation, to influence the baby from the very start.
Osmotic Learning
"A great deal of the education at the outset here is rather osmotic," said the CEO.
It's through this osmosis that the family are hoping the child will acquire the UK customs they wish to instil.
The consultant noted the tutor needed to be an individual who attended "the appropriate educational institutions – the same kinds of schools as the family hope to send their son to".
"The educator must be the appropriate candidate, they'll be doing things they don't even know they're doing, effortlessly," he said.
Expense Not a Factor
The family informed him the successful candidate should preferably also have understanding of or passion in horse riding, winter sports, the arts and instrumental training so as to influence the child in a broad spectrum of hobbies.
Furthermore though, he explained the family desired the tutor to register the child on a selection of courses so the child would be "equestrian training and learning an tool by the time they are approximately three years old".
In the family's minds, helping their son develop into a "UK sophisticate" will lead to accomplishment and open doors.
"Taking into account the rights and wrongs of that, because it's certainly a class statement," he adds.
However, despite all this guidance in "UK identity", would the child absorb what is termed cultural bias from the globally influenced family he resides with anyway?
"Yes", said he. "The family know this might not succeed, but they've merely embraced the view of, 'why not attempt it and let's go as soon as we can', because the expense of it is not relevant," he stated.
Overly Optimistic
There are some in the education sector who have similar doubts.
Peter Cui, chief executive of Blue Education, who also offer individual instructors, wrote that "the process of embracing two identities, or actually, becoming oneself, is something that must be lived into, not manufactured."
Peter wrote that he had emigrated from the Far East to the UK at the age of seven, and had been brought up experiencing and practicing dual heritages. He progressed to be educated at a prestigious UK institution.
"The concept that one individual can act as a embodiment of Britishness, someone who can somehow transfer the attributes of a British gentleman to a one-year-old child, strikes me as naive and impractical," he wrote.
"In my experience, having a quintessentially British tutor from babyhood will does not necessarily produce the result they hope for.
"I never had such a figure, and yet I have been fortunate enough to enjoy several of the situations they aspire for their son."
He continued: "The truth is, cultural identity should not be imposed from the outside; it must be selected, and it must be internally driven."
Purchasing UK Culture
Certainly, English culture is something the CEO thinks can be taught – and sold.
"I believe the situation that the world views us in this regard is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
