Jesse Williams And Glenn Kaino’s Homeschooled Is The New Trivia Game App For The Culture

Actor Jesse Williams and conceptual artist Glenn Kaino have teamed up to create Homeschooled, a new trivia app on Black culture and history.

The app, which aims to make learning fun again, features trivia questions in over 50 categories and can be played alone or with friends and family.

Trivia questions cover topics like pop culture, history, science, music, geography, and art, with category names like “Growing Up Black,” “Kicks” and “Street Fashion.” There is even a Grey’s Anatomy section with science-related questions, which is a nod to Williams’ role as Dr Jackson Avery on the ABC medical drama.

The app can be played by people of all ages, and the top scorers can earn bragging rights and the “cultural crown.”

Our history, our culture

Williams, who taught in a Philadelphia high school for six years before pursuing his acting career, will operate as the platform’s dean of culture. Special guest teachers will also join them to share their knowledge.

Williams and Kaino launched the app through Visibility Media, the company they co-founded with Arturo Nuñez, a former Apple executive. Other Visibility Media offerings include BleBRiTY, an award-winning Afrocentric gaming app that riffs off charades and Ya Tú Sabes, a Latine trivia game described as Loteria meets charades.

“They’re not going to teach us about Black or brown or Asian history in school ― OK, how can we teach it to ourselves?”

Noting the shift towards virtual learning at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Williams took the opportunity to challenge what he saw as the limitations of traditional education.

“You have to be more self-reliant if you want your history to be taught because we have this war on nonwhite history in American schools,” Williams told the Huffington Post. “They’re not going to teach us about Black or brown or Asian history in school ― OK, how can we teach it to ourselves?”

Homeschooled aims to do just that―providing a fun and engaging way for people to learn about history, science, and culture.

Making learning fun again

“We can learn and laugh at the same time and do so without excluding huge swaths of the population just because that’s how it’s always been’” Williams said in a news release, according to Afrotech.

Kaino added, “Through our Teacher’s Pet program, we know our community will tell us what we need to know by submitting new questions and answers that will help us all grow and game together.”

“Everyone is welcome to dive in, celebrate and challenge their friends, families, and that random person who thinks they know more than you.”

Williams and Kaino have plans to expand the app’s reach by adding new categories, questions, and features drawn from user submissions. Kaino said, “Everyone has something to teach, and everyone has something to learn.”