The 529 savings account program has just reached 250,000 accounts. The 529 account is a federal program established in 1996 and helps student save for college.

The state of Georgia has seen a 41.5 percent increase in contributions as well as a 9 percent increase in new account’s opened in the last 12 months.

“Education is a vital building block to help our children achieve success and we are proud to offer Georgia families a way to help save for continued education,” said Georgia Governor Brian Kemp in a news release. “Today, we applaud an important achievement as the plan reached 250,000 account owners, but more importantly, we are celebrating that with every account opened, more Georgia children have a financial plan to help them achieve their goals.”

As of May 31, 2021, there is more than $4.4 billion saved in the Path2College 529 Plan and $1.3 billion has already been used to pay for education-related expenses.

Currently the state of Georgia has a total of 64.6 billion in total student loan debt.