This family will pay a tutor $330K to help their 1 year old become an ‘English gentleman’

A tutor and a student. (Pexels/Katerina Holmes)

A U.K.-based family is offering a six-figure salary to someone who can tutor their son on how to be an “English gentleman.” The twist? He’s only a one year old.

The ad in question went viral, attracting plenty of qualified candidates.

Adam Caller, the founder and CEO of Tutors International, where the ad was originally posted, told CTVNews.ca Tuesday that he’s managed to connect the family with five potential educators who are “perfectly suited” for what the role had required. In total, he says there were 230 applicants.

The posting for the anonymous family requested that the tutor “provide a comprehensive British cultural environment,” as well as incorporate “regular musical activities” that “expose him to classical music from Western composers.”

Additionally, the ad states that the family would like the tutor to start preparing the baby to eventually be accepted into a “top-flight school such as Eton, St Paul’s, Westminster or Harrow.”

The ad also details that the parents are looking to cultivate their son into a “truly bicultural child,” and that having started at age five with his older brother was “too late to achieve their goal.”

Caller said that the family is simply articulating what they want in an educator, and for their child.

“(They want) that person to be on board before the child starts to develop language, taste, preferences, musical preferences, and all the things that are culturally binding, and perhaps even subconscious things,” he said. “You can’t predict when is too early.”

The position is intended to be long term, with the ad listing the duration as “12 months initially, renewable for many years”.

“It’s not this idea that somebody’s going to try and sit at a desk and teach a one year old Shakespeare,” Caller said.

The salary is listed as £180,000 per year, equivalent to more than C$330,000. Caller explains that it’s not unique for this line of work.

“Anyone who works at (a) high-level private service is being paid a lot of money for this kind of commitment to another family,” he said.

The ad for the tutor, which Caller stressed isn’t a nannying position, has attracted media attention from around the world. Caller expressed bewilderment, given that similar roles are posted to his site in similar price ranges, including a current one based in Beijing for a one-year-old girl and three-year-old boy, which pays US$180,000 (more than C$250,000) annually.

Caller added that the highest annual tutor salary that he’s seen was US$400,000, or C$560,000.