Financial aid guru Mark Kantrowitz spotted this IRS special rule that applies to next year only.

The IRS will allow families in 529 college savings plans to change their investments twice a year, instead of just once. Also, you could change your investments under certain cases, say, you were changing the beneficiary or moving from one plan to another.

“This special rule will allow families to adjust their asset allocations in response to turmoil in the stock market,” Kantrowitz writes in an e-mail. “However, selling the investments now will lock in losses and may cause families to miss a possible recovery.” You could, for instance, sell when the market suddenly plunges and miss out when it recovers a day or two later.

Also adds Kantrowitz: “A family can take a deduction for a loss on a 529 college savings plan or other qualified tuition plan (e.g., Coverdell Education Savings Account), but only if they liquidate the account in full and only as a miscellaneous itemized deduction on Schedule A of IRS Form 1040 (i.e., subject to the 2% of AGI threshold). You cannot treat it as a capital loss.”