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"Parents located in the northern part of London seeks an remarkable and skilled instructor to assist their smallest child on his initial journey to growing into an British gentleman."

When reading this listing, you might easily miss the term "first-steps" as simple a turn of phrase.

However, it may be the most significant part of this unique employment listing, as it aims to recruit a mentor for a infant.

Hundreds of submissions have already been sent in since the anonymous family advertised their call for the £180,000 per year tutor, who needs to be "a uniquely qualified person".

Over the last few weeks, the listing has attracted attention in the media, with many questioning why?

Innovative Idea

The CEO, CEO and founder of an education consultancy, which is helping the family in their search, said that in spite of initial doubt, he considered the concept "far sighted", and "advanced".

When he spoke with the family, he said they appreciated the unusual nature of their request, and how immature their son is.

However, they stated that they "preferred not to postpone any longer" to hire a tutor, as they had held off until their elder sibling was five, and by that age "cultural influence had already become established".

But what did the family indicate by "cultural leaning"?

It's "comprehensive", he replied. "How you eat, the way you speak".

He stated the older sibling had absorbed "extremely delicate, non-verbal cues" from the family, and had assumed their cultural ways. The family explained to the consultant they hoped to prevent the same situation to happen again with their infant.

The plan: To hire a English tutor, who should speak with standard English accent, to influence the baby from day one.

Subtle Influence

"Much of the education at the outset here is somewhat osmotic," stated the expert.

It's through this natural absorption that the family are hoping the child will adopt the English characteristics they want to instil.

The consultant said the tutor had to be someone who went to "prestigious academies – similar types of schools as the family aspire to send their son to".

"The instructor simply needs to be the right kind of person, they'll be doing things they don't even know they're doing, effortlessly," he commented.

Money No Object

The family told the expert the chosen tutor should ideally also have familiarity of or passion in horse riding, skiing, creative fields and musical activities so as to influence the child in a wide range of interests.

More than that though, he stated the family desired the tutor to enrol the child on a selection of classes so the child would be "horseback riding and picking up an tool by the time they are around three years old".

In the family's minds, guiding their son become a "UK sophisticate" will lead to success and provide access.

"Considering the rights and wrongs of that, because it's definitely a status symbol," he notes.

However, in spite of all this tutelage in "UK identity", would the child pick up alleged cultural leaning from the multicultural family he resides with in any case?

"Absolutely", replied he. "They realize this might not succeed, but they've simply adopted the view of, 'let's give it a go and we should start as soon as we can', because the price of it is not relevant," he explained.

Overly Optimistic

There are some in the education sector who have these reservations.

Peter Cui, chief executive of a tutoring service, who provides individual instructors, wrote that "the development of adopting dual cultures, or in fact, forming one's identity, is something that must be lived into, not engineered."

The expert noted that he had emigrated from China to the UK at the period of seven, and had been raised understanding and living dual heritages. He progressed to study at Cambridge University.

"The notion that one individual can act as a representation of Britishness, someone who can in some way impart the characteristics of a English gentleman upon a one-year-old child, appears idealistic and unfeasible," he stated.

"From my perspective, employing a distinctly British tutor from early childhood will will not automatically produce the result they want.

"I never had that kind of mentor, and nevertheless I have been fortunate enough to experience numerous of the situations they hope for their son."

He stated: "The fact is, personal identity can not be imposed from the outside; it must be embraced, and it must come from within."

Acquiring Englishness

Certainly, Britishness is something the CEO believes can be instructed – and commercialized.

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