"Parents located in north London wants to find an exceptional and experienced tutor to guide their youngest child on his first steps to becoming an British gentleman."
Upon seeing this post, you might naturally overlook the wording "beginning" as just figurative language.
Yet, it may be the most important element of this distinctive employment listing, as it attempts to hire a mentor for a one-year-old.
Hundreds of applications have already been sent in since the anonymous family advertised their call for the highly paid tutor, who has to be "a uniquely qualified person".
Over the last few weeks, the advert has attracted notice throughout the news, with several questioning why?
Forward-Thinking Method
A tutoring expert, CEO and founder of an education consultancy, which is assisting the family in their search, explained that in spite of first scepticism, he considered the idea "forward-looking", and "advanced".
When he consulted 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 engage a tutor, as they had held off until their elder sibling was five, and by that point "cultural conditioning had already set in".
But what did the family indicate by "cultural bias"?
It's "all-encompassing", he responded. "The manner you eat, the way you speak".
He explained the older sibling had absorbed "very nuanced, unspoken signals" from the family, and had taken on their cultural habits. The family told the consultant they wished to avoid history to repeat itself with their infant.
The intention: To engage a English tutor, who needs to speak with Received Pronunciation, to shape the baby right from the beginning.
Natural Absorption
"A great deal of the education at the outset here is rather absorbed naturally," explained Adam.
It's by means of this natural absorption that the family are aiming the child will acquire the English characteristics they want to cultivate.
The consultant said the tutor must be somebody who attended "prestigious academies – comparable categories of schools as the family plan to send their son to".
"The educator must be the appropriate candidate, they'll be doing things they aren't even aware they're doing, just naturally," he said.
Expense Not a Factor
The family explained to Adam the selected educator should ideally also have knowledge of or enthusiasm in horse riding, alpine skiing, artistic pursuits and music so as to inspire the child in a broad spectrum of hobbies.
Additionally though, he stated the family desired the tutor to enrol the child on a range of classes so the child would be "equestrian training and picking up an instrument by the time they are around three years old".
In the family's view, guiding their son become a "UK sophisticate" will lead to achievement and open doors.
"For all the rights and wrongs of that, because it's definitely a status symbol," he notes.
Yet, notwithstanding all this guidance in "English culture", might the child absorb what is termed cultural influence from the international family he resides with regardless?
"Absolutely", said Adam. "They understand this might not succeed, but they've just taken the attitude of, 'we should try and we'll proceed as early as we can', because the cost of it is not a concern," he explained.
Impractical
Several in the education sector who share those concerns.
Peter Cui, chief executive of a tutoring service, who also offer private tutors, wrote that "the journey of becoming bicultural, or actually, becoming oneself, is something that must be lived into, not manufactured."
Peter explained that he had moved from the Far East to the Britain at the time of seven, and had been brought up experiencing and embodying two backgrounds. He progressed to be educated at a prestigious UK institution.
"The idea that one individual can serve as a living vessel of UK identity, someone who can somehow impart the characteristics of a English gentleman upon a infant child, seems to me naive and unfeasible," he wrote.
"In my experience, employing a typically UK tutor from babyhood will will not instantly achieve the result they desire.
"I did not have that kind of mentor, and however I have been lucky enough to experience several of the opportunities they hope for their son."
He continued: "The fact is, cultural identity cannot be dictated from the outside; it must be selected, and it must be internally driven."
Purchasing UK Culture
Naturally, English culture is something the expert hopes can be taught – and commercialized.
"I believe the situation that the world regards us in this respect is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
