"Parents based in North London seeks an remarkable and skilled educator to guide their smallest child on his early path to turning into an English gentleman."
Looking at this listing, you might easily skip the wording "first-steps" as simple a turn of phrase.
Yet, it might be the most important element of this unusual employment listing, as it aims to recruit a teacher for a 12-month-old.
Many of applications have now been received since the anonymous family posted their search for the highly paid tutor, who must be "an exceptional individual".
During the past few weeks, the advert has gained notice in the news, with many questioning why?
Innovative Idea
The CEO, CEO and founder of Tutors International, which is assisting the family in their search, explained that in spite of early skepticism, he found the concept "visionary", and "innovative".
When he met the family, he said they understood the unusual nature of their demand, and how young their son is.
But, they clarified that they "didn't want to wait any longer" to get a tutor, as they had held off until their older child was five, and by that point "cultural bias had already taken hold".
But what does the family indicate by "cultural leaning"?
It's "comprehensive", he responded. "The way you eat, how you speak".
He said the elder child had adopted "very nuanced, unspoken signals" from the family, and had adopted their cultural habits. The family informed Adam they hoped to prevent history to repeat itself with their infant.
The strategy: To engage a English tutor, who must speak with standard English accent, to guide the baby right from the beginning.
Natural Absorption
"A great deal of the learning at the outset here is rather osmotic," explained Adam.
It's via this osmosis that the family are hoping the child will acquire the English characteristics they want to impart.
Adam said the tutor had to be somebody who went to "prestigious academies – the same kinds of schools as the family plan to send their son to".
"The instructor simply needs to be the appropriate candidate, they'll be performing things they don't even know they're doing, just naturally," he added.
Cost Not Relevant
The family told Adam the successful candidate should preferably also have familiarity of or passion in horse riding, alpine skiing, artistic pursuits and musical activities so as to influence the child in a broad spectrum of passions.
Furthermore though, he explained the family hoped the tutor to enrol the child on a range of lessons so the child would be "horseback riding and learning an tool by the time they are about three years old".
In the family's minds, assisting their son become a "UK sophisticate" will bring about success and open doors.
"For all the pros and cons of that, because it's undoubtedly a class statement," he comments.
Yet, notwithstanding all this guidance in "UK identity", would the child absorb so-called cultural leaning from the international family he resides with in any case?
"Certainly", replied he. "They know this might not succeed, but they've merely embraced 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 a concern," he said.
Overly Optimistic
There are some in the private teaching field who express those concerns.
An education leader, chief executive of a tutoring service, who also offer personal educators, commented that "the process of adopting dual cultures, or in fact, forming one's identity, is something that must be lived into, not manufactured."
He explained that he had moved from the Far East to the Britain at the age of childhood, and had been raised experiencing and embodying dual heritages. He went on to study at Cambridge University.
"The concept that a single person can function as a living vessel of English culture, an individual who can somehow transfer the characteristics of a UK sophisticate upon a 12-month-old child, seems to me optimistic and unrealistic," he wrote.
"In my experience, employing a typically British tutor from babyhood will not instantly produce the goal they desire.
"I never had such a figure, and yet I have been lucky enough to enjoy numerous of the experiences they aspire for their son."
He added: "The reality is, cultural identity should not be dictated from the outside influences; it must be embraced, and it must originate internally."
Buying Britishness
Of course, UK identity is something the CEO thinks can be instructed – and marketed.
"In my view the reality that the global community regards us in this regard is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating
