Builder Spotlight is back, continuing the past two weeks’ tradition of highlighting developers who submitted projects to the Self track of Celo Foundation’s Proof of Ship 6 virtual hackathon. This week, we’re looking at Isaac Jesse’s work leveraging the Self SDK for zero-knowledge (ZK) powered humanity. 

Isaac is a full-stack Web3 developer who first entered the industry in 2017 as a blogger. He’s since taken his passion for frontier infrastructure and technology to the next level, creating Learna, an AI-powered educational initiative designed to encourage learning through fun and rewarding activities. 

Initially born out of the Farcaster Quiz Hackathon, Learna combines AI-generated quizzes, interactive content, and blockchain rewards to make continuous learning both engaging and verifiable. Powered by NextJS, React, and Solidity, Learna leverages Celo for onchain rewards and the Self Protocol SDK for secure, privacy-preserving identity verification. The result is a Farcaster-native mini-app that redefines how developers stay current in a fast-moving tech landscape. 

Building a platform that distributes rewards, Isaac recognized the need for a solution to protect against sybils and bad actors. Self offered that solution, preserving user privacy while ensuring that only real, verified humans were able to claim rewards. This is why Isaac added the Self-verification step to the reward claiming process. 

The Self team went deeper into his experience to learn more about Isaac’s work and the long-term vision for Learna: 

What inspired you to develop Learna?

I’m passionate about impacting lives. Outside of Web3, I run an educational hub called Skiller where I help both young people and adults to learn new skills, especially programming. Learna was a product of my passion and a result of my participation in Farcaster's quiz hackathon. Although I didn't win, I was optimistic about its success. Ever since then, I have devoted more of my time to scaling the project.

When did you decide identity verification was a core pillar necessary to solve for, and why did you solve this with Self?

Since Learna rewards learners, it became pertinent to filter out bad actors who might try to cheat the system. I was also searching for a way to attract real users when I noticed the Self-sponsored track, shared by Celo Foundation DevRel Partner Lena in the Proof-of-Ship group. Interestingly, I picked the project name 'Learna' since I was always encouraged by Lena, and the idea is all about learning. 

As a developer, I would dive deeper into documentation before I jump on any protocol. Going through the Self docs gave me added insights into why I needed it. I wouldn't integrate Self if there weren't onchain capabilities, but Self offers both onchain and offchain attestations. Since I have been working with smart contracts, it made it a lot easier to leverage Self’s onchain identity system.

What's your vision for the future of Learna?

I plan to grow Learna into a world where learning becomes fun and effortless. For example, as a developer, you don't need to strain yourself to understand protocols or documentation. Learna is designed to help you learn faster, feel like you're with a tutor, and earn rewards for your time.

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