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"A family based in north London wants to find an extraordinary and skilled educator to assist their youngest child on his first steps to turning into an English gentleman."

When reading this listing, you might easily skip the phrase "initial stages" as just a turn of phrase.

But, it could be the most significant part of this distinctive employment listing, as it aims to recruit a tutor for a 12-month-old.

Hundreds of applications have since been sent in since the anonymous family advertised their search for the highly paid tutor, who needs to be "someone very special".

In recent few weeks, the post has received notice in the news, with many questioning why?

Innovative Idea

The CEO, head and founder of a global tutoring firm, which is helping the family in their search, explained that despite initial skepticism, he viewed the plan "visionary", and "innovative".

When he spoke with the family, he noted they understood the unusual character of their demand, and how young their son is.

However, they clarified that they "didn't want to wait any longer" to hire a tutor, as they had postponed until their elder sibling was five, and by that stage "cultural bias had by then set in".

But what did the family mean by "cultural predisposition"?

It's "all-encompassing", he answered. "The manner you eat, the manner you speak".

He explained the elder child had absorbed "extremely delicate, non-verbal cues" from the family, and had taken on their cultural ways. The family told Adam they did not want history to happen again with their younger child.

The strategy: To bring in a UK tutor, who should speak with RP, to shape the baby from the very start.

Natural Absorption

"A lot of the learning at the start here is rather absorbed naturally," stated the CEO.

It's through this subtle influence that the family are hoping the child will pick up the English characteristics they aim to instil.

Adam said the tutor needed to be someone who attended "prestigious academies – similar types of schools as the family plan to send their son to".

"The educator just has to be the suitable individual, they'll be carrying out things they aren't even aware they're doing, effortlessly," he said.

Money No Object

The family told him the chosen tutor should ideally also have knowledge of or enthusiasm in riding, winter sports, artistic pursuits and music so as to influence the child in a diverse set of passions.

Furthermore though, he stated the family wanted the tutor to enrol the child on a range of courses so the child would be "equestrian training and picking up an musical instrument by the time they are approximately three years old".

In the family's view, guiding their son grow into a "English gentleman" will lead to accomplishment and open doors.

"Considering the advantages and disadvantages of that, because it's undoubtedly a class statement," he comments.

But, despite all this tutelage in "English culture", might the child absorb alleged cultural leaning from the globally influenced family he resides with regardless?

"Absolutely", replied he. "The parents understand this may not work, but they've just taken the attitude of, 'let's give it a go and let's go as soon as we can', because the cost of it is irrelevant," he stated.

Impractical

A number of in the private teaching field who share similar reservations.

An education leader, chief executive of Blue Education, who supplies individual instructors, stated that "the journey of becoming bicultural, or actually, discovering oneself, is something that must be lived into, not engineered."

He wrote that he had emigrated from China to the United Kingdom at the time of childhood, and had been brought up understanding and living dual heritages. He progressed to be educated at the University of Cambridge.

"The notion that a single person can act as a embodiment of English culture, a person who can somehow impart the qualities of a UK sophisticate to a 12-month-old child, appears idealistic and unfeasible," he wrote.

"In my experience, employing a typically UK tutor from early childhood will does not automatically create the goal they desire.

"I never had such a figure, and however I have been lucky enough to enjoy several of the opportunities they hope for their son."

He continued: "The fact is, personal identity cannot be imposed from the outside; it must be embraced, and it must be internally driven."

Buying Britishness

Naturally, UK identity is something the expert thinks can be instructed – and sold.

"In my view the fact that the international society holds us in this respect is something that we should be cherishing|valuing|appreciating