"Parents located in North London wants to find an exceptional and experienced tutor to assist their smallest child on his initial journey to growing into an English gentleman."
Looking at this listing, you might readily miss the term "initial stages" as just a turn of phrase.
Yet, it could be the most important part of this unusual job advert, as it aims to recruit a mentor for a one-year-old.
Hundreds of applications have now been submitted since the anonymous family posted their request for the £180k-a-year tutor, who needs to be "a uniquely qualified person".
In recent few weeks, the advert has attracted interest in the media, with many asking why?
Forward-Thinking Method
Adam Caller, CEO and founder of an education consultancy, which is helping the family in their search, explained that notwithstanding early skepticism, he viewed the idea "far sighted", and "progressive".
When he met the family, he mentioned they recognized the unconventional aspect of their request, and how immature their son is.
Nevertheless, they stated that they "didn't want to wait any longer" to engage a tutor, as they had held off until their older child was five, and by that age "cultural bias had already set in".
What precisely did the family mean by "cultural bias"?
It's "all-encompassing", he responded. "The manner you eat, the manner you speak".
He said the firstborn had picked up "very nuanced, unspoken signals" from the family, and had adopted their cultural norms. The family explained to Adam they wished to avoid the same situation to repeat itself with their infant.
The strategy: To hire a UK tutor, who must speak with standard English accent, to shape the baby right from the beginning.
Osmotic Learning
"A great deal of the learning at the outset here is rather acquired indirectly," stated the CEO.
It's through this natural absorption that the family are aiming the child will acquire the British traits they wish to instil.
He explained the tutor must be someone who attended "the right kinds of schools – comparable categories of schools as the family plan to send their son to".
"The educator simply needs to be the suitable individual, they'll be performing things they may not realize they're doing, effortlessly," he added.
Cost Not Relevant
The family informed Adam the selected educator should preferably also have understanding of or enthusiasm in horse riding, winter sports, creative fields and instrumental training so as to shape the child in a diverse set of interests.
More than that though, he explained the family hoped the tutor to register the child on a variety of courses so the child would be "horseback riding and learning an tool by the time they are approximately three years old".
In the family's view, guiding their son become a "English gentleman" will bring about achievement and create opportunities.
"For all the pros and cons of that, because it's undoubtedly a social class indicator," he adds.
Yet, notwithstanding all this instruction in "UK identity", might the child pick up what is termed cultural bias from the globally influenced family he is raised by in any case?
"Absolutely", said he. "The parents realize this may not work, but they've just taken the attitude of, 'we should try and we'll proceed as soon as we can', because the cost of it is not relevant," he explained.
Impractical
A number of in the education sector who share these doubts.
Another CEO, head and founder of an educational organization, who supplies personal educators, stated that "the process of embracing two identities, or in fact, discovering oneself, is something that must be experienced personally, not engineered."
The expert explained that he had moved from Asia to the Britain at the time of childhood, and had been brought up experiencing and living dual heritages. He progressed to learn at Cambridge University.
"The idea that an individual can act as a living vessel of UK identity, an individual who can possibly transplant the qualities of a English gentleman onto a infant child, seems to me naive and unrealistic," he commented.
"Based on my background, engaging a typically UK tutor from early childhood will not necessarily create the outcome they desire.
"I never had that kind of mentor, and nevertheless I have been privileged enough to experience many of the opportunities they aspire for their son."
He stated: "The truth is, self-identity can not be forced from the outside; it must be chosen, and it must be internally driven."
Buying Britishness
Of course, UK identity is something the expert hopes can be taught – and commercialized.
"I believe the situation that the international society holds us in this light is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
