Andrea | Virginia

I'm Andrea and I'm an attorney. My sons are Ameen (23) and Adam (22). I chose Virginia529 because I wanted to support Virginia. I researched the plan and thought it was wonderful. Given that we have a wonderful education system in Virginia I thought it was likely my sons would choose Virginia colleges. If not, I knew I still had the option to use my account at schools in other states.

The discipline of making regular, consistent contributions to my sons’ accounts attracted me to the prePAID program. The contributions were like a car payment and a mortgage: I had to pay it. I couldn’t let myself say “I don’t have the money this month.” I really needed that discipline.

In 2008, after I had fully paid for my sons’ prePAID accounts, I was laid off from my job. By May, I didn’t have a regular salary and I decided to open my own law office. My family faced a lot of unknowns at that time, but one thing we did know was that our sons had four years of college tuition paid for through the program. So I had great comfort knowing that, no matter what happened in my practice or in my job search, I had their education taken care of.

My oldest son has graduated and my younger is still in college. The first time I logged in to Ameen’s tuition account with the university and saw the amount Virginia529 paid, I wanted to kiss the computer screen. Virginia529 was a great comfort because education is very important.