The student is growing up in a very loving environment with her father and step-mother. They are both professional sports competitors and travel frequently. Her principal carer has been a nanny, with whom she has had a very close relationship. Her parents have decided that the nanny has been doing too much for her, stifling her independence and maturity. Instead of the nanny, she now has a companion. The companion’s role is to help her with day-to-day tasks as well as providing enrichment activities such as sports and games. Elements of her role could evolve to more closely resemble that of a teaching assistant working closely with the Tutor.

The student has always been behind her classmates at school. It has been suggested that she has a learning difficulty of some kind and many tests have been carried out to attempt to diagnose this. The most recent shows very poor function in all areas, with many scores being in the first percentile. However, her abilities at home with her family do not at all reflect these findings, and it is clear that these results are misleading. For example, the report shows that she has a very low working memory score, yet she can remember complicated show jumping routines, is learning to play the piano, can speak Portuguese, English and some French and is showing interest in learning some Swedish words. Even though recent test results are unreliable, it does seem to be the case that she has some learning differences that need to be taken into account.

She is now several years behind her class and, not surprisingly her current school now feels unable to offer her the differentiated educational pathway that she needs. The decision has been taken to home school her. This will either continue all the way through her secondary education or until it is felt that returning to mainstream schooling is appropriate. Even then, a full time after-school support role might be sensible.

The initial objective of the tutoring is to enable her to live a ‘normal’ life with particular emphasis placed on arithmetic, handling money, time calculations etc. and other core skills. A transition back to mainstream school at some point in the future must also remain an option. If and when the family decide that she should be re-enrolled in school, they will give the Tutor sufficient notice to allow a successful transfer to the desired education system and specific school.

The student is a bright and cheerful girl, polite, friendly, and engaging. She has many hobbies, and very much enjoys horseback riding. She also plays the piano, goes swimming and loves spending time with her pets. She works hard and will persevere until she has achieved her objective. Although she can be quite shy and anxious when she first meets new people, she quickly relaxes and opens up. She comes across as a sweet girl with a good sense of humour.

She is generally driven and determined. She is very willing to comply with what is asked of her, although sometimes needs to have instructions repeated and clarified for her. She is currently being treated medically for attention deficit, though there are signs that she is growing out of the symptoms that this regime is addressing.

The student will benefit from the routine brought about by a structured day. The Tutor will work with the family to create an appropriate schedule. It is likely that this will build from a relatively low initial formal teaching load to a fuller day as the student’s confidence increases.

The Tutor will be responsible for all of the student’s education. This will include the formal curriculum elements, but initially at least, the primary objective will be to improve the student’s life skills. The Tutor will also be responsible for co-ordinating any extra-curricular activities with the student’s companion and or other peripatetic instructors.

The Tutor should be a qualified teacher with mainstream classroom experience of managing children with a range of SEN. The exact nature of the student’s learning style is not clear, so the Tutor must be skilled at developing and adapting teaching strategies to determine what works best for her. The Tutor must be a fluent English speaker. Some Portuguese or an aptitude for languages would be desirable, but not essential. The Tutor must be discreet and able to maintain the Client’s high standards of privacy. They must be socially adept and comfortable with a broad range of social environments.

As well as the core teaching responsibilities, the Tutor should be able to contribute to and help to develop the student’s extra-curricular interests, whether this is through sports, games, art, music, or any other appropriate activities. Combining learning with these activities and involving the companion’s work with the student will provide a seamless and continuous learning environment in which she can thrive. Due to the all-round nature of this role it will be best suited to a younger person, someone physically fit, energetic and lively, a broad and interesting person who has a wide range of interests they would love to share with her.

The Tutor will need to be patient, with a calm yet determined disposition. The student responds well to clear instructions and expectations, so the Tutor will need to be thorough when it comes to preparation, documentation and interpretation of her work with the student. The Tutor will need to be skilled at finding alternate teaching pathways; if one way doesn’t work, then try another... The Tutor should have a background of experience of working with students with a range of learning styles and be able to adjust the pace of her plans to maximise progress without causing undue stress.

As has been described earlier, the student clearly has some kind of impediment to her learning, but extensive testing has so far been inconclusive. This means the successful Tutor will need to start working with the student without a clear background history and will need to remain open-minded, continuously reviewing their own work and helping to develop strategies to minimise the impact that standard schooling has so far caused. If the student can master techniques that allow her to match her peers in school it is of little importance what the root cause of her current situation might have been.

Reporting is a particularly sensitive area of this assignment, and the Tutor must be mindful to remain guarded, especially with any other members of the family’s staff. Private details of the Tutor’s work should remain private from all but those specified to the Tutor after the commencement of the job. Equally, the Tutor should be cautious about raising concerns about those non-tutoring parameters that affect the tutoring, such as sleep and nutrition. The family is aware of the importance of these, and is addressing them. The Tutor should note that this is a long-term role and that while change is important, rushing such changes is not, and it is more important that the Tutor remains flexible and easygoing at this level than that she presses to change anything even if it impacts on the productivity of teaching in the shorter term.

This is a full time position. The Tutor must be able to respond flexibly to the client’s requirements in terms of availability and working time, and able to adapt calmly to the Client’s fluid schedule. She should expect to work around 40 hours per week on average. Preparation time is in addition to these contact hours.

The Tutor will be entitled to two consecutive days off per week, which will not necessarily coincide with weekends. The standard contractual annual vacation of nine weeks (45 working days) paid holiday per year applies. The family often travel from Thursday until Sunday; the Tutor may need to accompany them on occasion, by prior arrangement.

The client will provide furnished accommodation for the Tutor. The Client will provide meals occurring during the tutoring. The Tutor will have access to a car for reasonable personal use, but the Tutor is responsible for fuel for non-work reasons.

The Client and his family will sometimes travel for extended periods, during which the Tutor may be required to accompany them to provide as much continuity as possible in the student’s education. On these occasions, the Client will cover all travel and accommodation costs.

The Tutor must be a non-smoker.