"A family based in North London seeks an remarkable and qualified tutor to assist their most junior child on his early path to growing into an British gentleman."
Looking at this post, you might naturally overlook the phrase "first-steps" as just a turn of phrase.
However, it could be the crucial aspect of this unusual job advert, as it seeks to hire a mentor for a one-year-old.
Hundreds of responses have since been received since the anonymous family advertised their call for the £180,000 per year tutor, who needs to be "an exceptional individual".
During the past few weeks, the post has received attention throughout the news, with numerous asking why?
Innovative Idea
The CEO, CEO and founder of Tutors International, which is assisting the family in their search, explained that in spite of first skepticism, he considered the plan "far sighted", and "advanced".
When he met the family, he mentioned they recognized the unusual nature of their request, and how early in age their son is.
But, they explained that they "didn't want to wait any longer" to get a tutor, as they had postponed until their older child was five, and by that point "cultural influence had by then taken hold".
What precisely did the family refer to by "cultural predisposition"?
It's "all-encompassing", the expert replied. "The way you eat, the way you speak".
He said the older sibling had adopted "very nuanced, unspoken signals" from the family, and had assumed their cultural norms. The family told Adam they wished to avoid this pattern to happen again with their younger child.
The intention: To bring in a English tutor, who needs to speak with Received Pronunciation, to shape the baby right from the beginning.
Osmotic Learning
"A great deal of the education at the beginning here is somewhat absorbed naturally," explained the expert.
It's through this osmosis that the family are hoping the child will acquire the British traits they aim to cultivate.
He noted the tutor must be someone who studied at "the appropriate educational institutions – the same kinds of schools as the family plan to send their son to".
"The tutor just has to be the right kind of person, they'll be carrying out things they aren't even aware they're doing, simply by nature," he said.
Money No Object
The family informed him the selected educator should preferably also have understanding of or interest in horse riding, winter sports, the arts and musical activities so as to influence the child in a wide range of interests.
Additionally though, he explained the family desired the tutor to enrol the child on a selection of courses so the child would be "pony-riding and picking up an tool by the time they are about three years old".
In the family's minds, assisting their son grow into a "UK sophisticate" will result in accomplishment and open doors.
"For all the rights and wrongs of that, because it's undoubtedly a status symbol," he comments.
However, notwithstanding all this tutelage in "UK identity", could the child adopt so-called cultural influence from the international family he lives with regardless?
"Absolutely", replied he. "The family realize this may not work, but they've simply adopted the view of, 'let's give it a go and we should start as quickly as we can', because the price of it is not relevant," he said.
Idealistic and Unrealistic
Several in the tutoring industry who have those reservations.
Peter Cui, CEO and founder of a tutoring service, who supplies personal educators, commented that "the process of becoming bicultural, or in fact, discovering oneself, is something that must be lived into, not engineered."
He noted that he had moved from China to the UK at the time of 7 years old, and had been brought up knowing and living dual heritages. He went on to study at Cambridge University.
"The idea that one individual can serve as a living vessel of English culture, someone who can somehow impart the attributes of a UK sophisticate to a 12-month-old child, strikes me as idealistic and unrealistic," he wrote.
"In my experience, having a distinctly British tutor from babyhood will does not instantly achieve the goal they want.
"I wasn't provided with such a tutor, and yet I have been lucky enough to live numerous of the experiences they hope for their son."
He continued: "The fact is, self-identity cannot be imposed from the outside; it must be chosen, and it must be internally driven."
Buying Britishness
Certainly, Britishness is something Adam thinks can be taught – and sold.
"I think the situation that the world views us in this respect is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
