Georgetown Law Grad Seeks Indiegogo Funding to Pay Student Loan Debt, Jumpstart Artistic Pursuits
Freilich’s fundraising video.
A Georgetown University law graduate is seeking donations on Indiegogo to, as he puts it, save him from living with his parents until he’s 40.
Nick Freilich, who is now 30, now makes about $40,000 a year, primarily by helping others study for the Law School Admission Test, the Huffington Post reports.
A desire not to be a starving artist until he died “inspired within me a tremendous self-delusion about my desire to become a lawyer,” he says. Unfortunately, midway through his efforts to earn a Georgetown law degree in 2007, he realized that he really did want to focus on artistic pursuits—writing fiction, and making music and movies. That led to a subsequent master’s degree in fine arts (which he says didn’t add much to his student debt) and living with his parents in Santa Monica, Calif.
“Thankfully we have a very strong relationship, and I enjoy spending time with them,” he told the Huffington Post. “But it definitely puts a damper on my growth, both as an artist and as a human in general.”
In the first few days of the Indiegogo campaign, Freilich has raised more than $300 by selling a download of an album he released while in law school ($10) and a personalized ringtone ($250). Among his other offerings are a personalized song for $500 and a tattoo (to be inked on Freilich) for $2,500.
He hopes his efforts on the crowdfunding site will both help him make a substantial dent in his $145,000 law school student loan debt (he says he originally borrowed $160,000) and draw attention to his artistic pursuits.
“But this isn’t just some high-tech panhandling. This is 21st century street busking,” he writes on Indiegogo. “In return for your generosity, I will create—movies, music, stories, pictures, poems—and do so specifically for you, with more spectacular and involved works going to those more giving.”
